


Blue Pond

by ozomin



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Blood and Gore, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Suicide Attempt, technically cannibalism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-19
Updated: 2019-11-19
Packaged: 2021-02-01 04:29:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21377545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ozomin/pseuds/ozomin
Summary: Yixing figures out what it means to feel without feeling when he meets a king that can't either.
Relationships: Kim Minseok | Xiumin/Zhang Yi Xing | Lay
Comments: 13
Kudos: 20
Collections: EXO MONSTERFEST 2019





	Blue Pond

**Author's Note:**

> Firstly I'd really like to thank the mods for putting up with me I'm so sorry ;;;;
> 
> Prompt M9 - hello prompter, as this was an older prompt I did deviate from it a bit however, all the base tenants of the prompt should still be there even if I did tweak them a little bit to suit my liking. 
> 
> Otherwise, please enjoy~

They can barely hear her, a garble of words lost behind layers of gossamer, and yet they read her needs perfectly, all without expression, communication, confirmation.

"Yes Your Majesty." Her back never faces her empress, thick skirts of deep red folded for her forehead to rest between her resting hands. "The judicial court has sentenced the Hanyang Jeong family for suspected treason against His Majesty. The head of the family, will appear to appeal to you in His Majesty's place."

More words she cannot hear but must know. More words that she must anticipate and understand without failure.

Words that claw themselves up a powdered throat, words that sound high and sharp like glass smashed against the wooden boards, just as indecipherable as the shards that slip through the cracks.

The cracks against which she brushes a stained cloth beneath the folds of her chima. Her empress mustn't see the oversight. 

"Of course, Your Majesty,"

She stands and backs away slowly from her empress, a beast hidden in the darkness of mid morning, her silhouette too muffled behind the gossamer. She closes the door behind her and asks the ladies in wait behind the door to prepare the empress's breakfast and subsequent clean up.

With knees and forehead to the boards he begs.

"Your excellency, please protect my family. I assure you there is no treasonous root within the Jeong line. We live to serve you and uphold your excellency as a blessing to our country."

He presses his forehead to the boards once more. Thinks that if he presses hard enough the empress will see his forgiveness in the red bruise that forms, will grant him mercy in the rigid ache of his knees.

More words, shears chipping frost away from the sills and the dull grind of a pestle grating annatto into powder strikes a shiver down his spine, her forgiveness stripped away like the buds from a plant. Left in its place the bare bones, the dry shrub, her bared teeth.

"Your excellency, I pledge to you my unwavering loyalty. Please spare my family."

He cannot see her and yet from behind the curtains that shade her, that hide her from direct view, her eyes bore through him, see the bruised tender skin, the desperate rich blood beneath, to the brittle bones that run raw with marrow.

"Please Your Majesty."

He is not her lady in waiting. The doors behind him, interlocking pine slats, jeweled ring handles, the inset of a copper lion guard the man from leaving.

He bows deep, pressed to the floorboards once more. Shuts his eyes.

She's careful to keep the gossamer straying in the summer heat, swaying as the eclipse to the sun. What one hand does, so does the other. When one shreds skin the other draws itself through the sinews as if through the ripple of the pond beneath her fingers in the gentle draw over the edge of the boat. Blood clotted glossy purple as the rich silk chima beneath her own cushioned knees spots the delicate powder of her cheeks. It soaks her fingers and lips like crushed plum pigment, she licks it away with pointed tongue.

Her empress renders the bones bare of flesh, licks away the desperation along the chalky distance between the clunky joints. She slides fingers into the depth of a socket, her other hand at her side mirrors the movement against nothing. It too then slips into the accompanying socket, beneath the jelly, along the nerve that can no longer feel. 

In her eyes the spread of blood across the floor is thick wood smoked honey, glistening sweetly with nectar, crystalline and bright with the flavor of still soft muscle that slip slides between her fingers. She smears the blood, the translucent fluid with her thumb, peels back the layers until bile and acid stain the puddle like drops of ink. 

He did not suffer. Her empress bites with the intention of death in mind. Severing the knobs of the spine where the head falls limply as if in desperate prayer. A last ditch plead for mercy. 

Her empress mercifully grants him that one wish. 

With fingers stained red and mouth slick with salivation, she opens her own milky eyes that begin to see for the first time that day. Her own milky eyes that without hunger cannot see. Once the hunger begins to rumble her own belly and fill it until blood can take its place, she lies empty and dormant. She lies beneath the mask of a king that cannot bare her weight and her desire, her hunger. A king that hides her from the eyes of the country he tends to in place of her. For she is selfish and he cannot survive without her, his self appointed other half. Two sides of an old brass won.

The king's empress begins to mistake blood as water and flesh as food. Her clouded eyes gone so clear, the light is painful and her pupils dilate like blood vessels squeezing shut. The cardiac arrest impending. Her belly grows full and the room grows thick with the stifling heat of tacky blood in the rising summer sun.

She grows sleepy. A bone, to which flesh still clings as if life is still possible, drops from her fingers into the puddle below. The head of the Hanyang Jeong family, is no longer person, easily mistakable for the rotted remains of a musk deer being reabsorbed into the earth.

Now the King's empress no longer sees the physical world. The body in front of her is living once more, writhing with pain that she has yet to inflict. His form is changing, melting, bones and skin splitting and reforming noiselessly until he has become a peasant maiden, the wife of a lord. She lies there with unpowdered, untouched skin. She is sleeping. She could be dead.

The empress reaches forward, seemingly hungry only for the touch to burn. There is fear now growing within her, wiping away all the flesh she's eaten, robbing her of the sight it gave her. The maiden still lies prone, unaware that she knows the beast that lies within the empress, could destroy her with the slightest touch. Her hair sun bleached and knotted at her nape with a jeweled clip that does not match the rest of her lower hierarchical wear. Pearls dot the length of brass like tears beading at her eyes, shine with the same morose luster too.

The fear rumbles in the belly of empress ever growing until it's unavoidable and she feels the same morose in her own beads of sweat that trickle down her temples, and her skin goes clammy before it begins to burn once more. More than the touch of the maiden, more than the touch of the sun perhaps. The empress can feel her bones begin to split and her own blood pooling where it shouldn't be inside her. She is the same fodder for the next beast that comes across her.

The king's empress closes her eyes, newly cloudy for she has seen too much.

...

Yixing draws the stick of bamboo fluidly back and forth against the bridge of his thumb and finger, drops of ink pin pricks into the expanse of skin next to him, the broad stretch of forearm of a carpenter. 

He follows the line of the arm, a neat loop into which he's dotting the lines of the character for "fortune" and "protection." Lean, easy practiced lines Yixing's done many many times before. The carpenter sits on his knees, pressed to the cushion, at Yixing's side, he's burly and bearded, the tie in his hair merely clothes scraps. 

He mentions to Yixing about his travels along the mountains and his wish to stay safe during them as he goes out more and more to sell his wares. Yixing only has enough focus in him to nod along and hum in affirmation, instead choosing to allocate his energy into the back and forth motion of the bamboo stick in his hand. 

The carpenter woes about his lack of a wife, his lack of a cook and Yixing tries to hide the grimace stretching his mouth tight. 

Yixing doesn't live alone in the magistrate building, he can hear his companions moving around in another room somewhere behind him. 

He's pretty sure one passes by the room because the carpenter makes a quip about taking her off Yixing's hands and if Yixing sticks the needle with a little more force than necessary the carpenter says nothing. On the wave of it is his simple reply of, "That's irrelevant," clipped and short enough he's sure he's closed the avenue of conversation exactly how he wanted. 

The rest of the session runs in a silence that can only be described as stifling. Yixing washes the finished product down gently with water before patting it dry, mercifully relieved that it is finished. He looks down at the rounded rectangular seal of black and the characters within it. Yixing bows respectfully while the carpenter thanks him for his good work. Yixing accepts his payments and lets the man go on his way. 

The magistrate building is nestled between the hills of the village, a ways from the crowded center, almost hidden in a shroud of trees if it weren't for the faded red tiles peeking through the boughs. 

Otherwise the surrounded wooden deck and gates are dappled in the thick shaded heat of late summer. 

Yixing finds them on the back deck, it faces one of the long winding paths that leads up the closest mountain to the villages beyond. The sun is already beginning to dip behind the nearest hillside in the distance, it paints the sky a watery ink blue. 

Yixing watches the hands of one as she methodically shapes and molds sweet rice into palm sized patties, she sprinkles each with dried strips of jujube before setting each aside on a wicker play mat beside her. Her long hair silky black and pooled behind her on the wooden boards. 

She looks up at him having been lost in thought. 

"You've finished?" She asks, "he didn't give me the most reliable feeling," she frowns, "was protection really necessary? He felt more demon than human to be honest."

It's Yixing's turn to frown, "These appointments pay for our clothes Seulgi ah, we can't turn everyone away. Even if they are ... unsavory. Maybe the charm will help him better realize his potential," he's barely gotten the sentence completely out and Seulgi has snorted into her hands. 

"You're hopeless Yixing, and dense as it gets," Seulgi says, "I don't see him changing any time soon, sure he's demon free now but that won't affect his entitlement, it'll probably exacerbate it," she's trying to keep her laughs in. 

"All right, all right, you know him better than I ever will with the way you see people," Yixing sighs, "Chaeyoung could probably feel the disdain, and by that I mean mine and that was enough probably," he reasons and this time he chuckles. 

Seulgi laughs and looks down at her hands, "I wish you could feel the way spirits move like us," she says, "Well, the way Chaeyoung does, we've tried teaching you again but your big head is full of the theoretical and thus has no room for the practical." She sighs this time, shaking her head and Yixing's expression is both resignation and indignation.

"I'll get a hang of it one of these days," Yixing says turning his attention to Chaeyoung who's sitting at the foot of the stairs tending to a steaming pot of rice above a smoldering coal grill. Next to her is the red patterned clay pot they use to store salted and fermenting fish and roe.

Yixing's stomach growls. 

Chaeyoung whips her head back, her hair, sun bleached brown and short moves with her when she looks at him. 

"Oh, Yixing ah, now you can watch the rice," she smiles, standing. She brushes her hands across the front of her skirt. There's a flash of black on the inside of her wrist. 

"Of course, Chaeyoung ah," Yixing takes her place at the bottom step. He watches her make her way up onto the deck singsonging "Seulgi~" the whole way, she pats Yixing's cheek in passing. 

Seulgi pats the spot next to her, moves her pile of dried and flattened corn husks closer to her to make room. Chaeyoung settles down next to her and begins to help her measure out rice cakes and press them flat before handing them to Seulgi to set aside on the mat. 

They're talking but Yixing can't completely hear them over the crackle of the fire and the sudden whistle of the steam escaping from the pot's ventilation hole at the top of the clay lid. 

He settles in holding two thick washcloths that Chaeyoung had left there for him to handle the hot pot with in his lap. 

It doesn't take long for his own mind to start wandering while he waits, there's a few plant boxes lining the wooden railing of the deck, each one full of rich dark soil. It doesn't take long for Chaeyoung to get sidetracked, Yixing watches her fingers flutter and the soil begin to form a small mound through a which a sprout breaches the surface as if in fast forward. It's bright green and springy, and from it sprigs pull strong from the main stem, until a dewy green corn husk settles in the dirt, too heavy for the stem to hold. She plucks it and husks it right there, revealing golden yellow kernels that she plucks easily with her fingers. 

Chaeyoung hands the husks to Seulgi's outstretched hand, fully expecting a dried one, she takes one look at the fresh husk and playfully swats Chaeyoung's shoulder with it. 

"You're supposed to be helping me wrap these," she says, there's no bite but Chaeyoung still pouts at her. 

Yixing doesn't hear the rest as he catches a whiff of what smells like burning rice. He's quick to pull the pot from the coals and onto one of the flat stones that surrounds it. Fortunately neither of the girls have noticed and Yixing breathes a sigh of relief. There's a wooden spoon next to the stove tools and Yixing's tempted to dig around in the pot to see the extent of the damage but he figures nothing's gone horribly wrong or caught fire so there shouldn't be a problem. 

"... just try it," Chaeyoung's pulling at her sleeves. "You can't teach Yixing to sense people and I can't teach you to harvest crops, the energy between us is lacking," she's whining against Seulgi's stubborn as ever demeanor. 

"I can do it," with a huff, and in perhaps the third time this week, Seulgi takes a deep breath and focuses on the sprout Chaeyoung seemed to manifest as easily as anything.

It shrivels. 

Seulgi frowns and Chaeyoung's trying to hold in her laughter. 

The stem dries out and flecks apart into the soil as if the sun had taken all of its life. 

"Seulgi ah," she says, "you'll get it one of these days." Chaeyoung pats her arm and Seulgi seems to just deflate right there. 

She sighs, all fight leaving her. "And here you are unable to sense a demon five feet away." 

"Perhaps not a pure one but one that's within a person, I swear I can," Chaeyoung says crossing her arms, she's not angry so much as indignant. 

"The king is clearly looking for someone spiritual to aid his wife, I think you're the right woman for the job."

"And marry him," Chaeyoung expression is halfway to disdain, "oh, you do it then. His Majesty is as dense as Yixing is, you'd be a perfect fit--"

Seulgi swats her with the corn husk again, neither of them can stop laughing. 

Yixing's ears perk up, "I've been busy all day what has the king said in regards to his empress?" 

"A message came this morning from Hangyang, the palace is looking for noble women with spiritual inclinations in hopes of taking care of his wife." Seulgi says, settling down as she scrapes the bottom of the her near empty bowl of sticky rice for the remnants. She molds a patty half the size of the others between her fingers and palm, "oh, Chaeyoung would you go get the letter I left it on the writing desk," Chaeyoung stands and immediately heads inside for it. 

Yixing stokes at the coals briefly with one of the metal tools next to him before he stands, taking the rice pot with him in hands padded with the folded washcloths. He settles in front of Seulgi on the deck proper, on the wooden boards and the small pile of wrapped cakes she's accumulated just as Chaeyoung appears again, in her hands the apparent letter which she hands to Yixing before taking her seat next to the plant box again. 

"He's looking for another wife," Chaeyoung says tapping her knees with her fingers. 

"Something about spiritual inclinations I think it said," Seulgi adds, "everyone knows the empress is ill, has been since any of us could remember. Clearly the politics are getting to him. He'll only see unrest if he doesn't have an heir. So he's looking for another wife."

Yixing's eyes scan the page, more or less affirming what they've been saying, he folds the letter closed and looks at the wax seal still holding onto one side of the folded envelope. The paper is thin and bright blue, and the seal is a waxy copper. What catches Yixing's eye is the imprint on the seal itself. It's the face of a lion, and between its teeth is a branch of wisteria. He can't seem to place where he'd seen it before. 

"That's also it," Seulgi says sitting up on her knees, placing the last folded cake to her side. "That seal, it's never been used on any of the other envoys from the palace."

"The original has the lion with a branch of gingko, but this one must be saying something else," Chaeyoung says looking down at her hands and that's when it clicks in Yixing's head. 

"Oh," one of the old texts they've been working to imprint into Yixing's head from the umpteenth lesson about practical skills in Korean spiritual theory. "It's one of..."

"Yes. There's an old passage, one that's fallen out of the norm of tenants that features a wisteria. The most recent reattribute of the wisteria is of faith and luck. Any noble person would read it as a King simply looking for another wife to take care of the first. But someone else- it comes in line with that phrase spiritual inclinations, that could also be read as loyal disposition or loyalty to the palace, the only reason we read it the way we did was because this is the realm of what we deal with. It comes back to that seal Yixing, in much older texts, the ones that have fallen out, the original meaning was warning and desperation." Seulgi says catching his eyes. 

Yixing looks from her face to Chaeyoung's, brows furrowed, his expression is a little furtive. 

Chaeyoung leans forward and presses the pad of her finger between his brows. "We think there's something going on at the palace Yixing, something that the king himself cannot deal with and thus he's searching for someone who can."

"Burning wisteria outside of homes to signal the presence of a demon to this is quite a jump," Yixing's not even sure he's convincing himself when he says that. He's sure Seulgi can feel it in the letter, in the loss of warmth the words no longer hold. "You can feel it can't you?" He says instead, already abandoning the doubt in him. 

Seulgi nods, "That seal is a cry for help. Perhaps he's not looking for a wife at all. On the off chance that whatever it is is within the king or even one of those below him, Chaeyoung would be able to tell us if we put her in the same room as them."

"And you want to go to Hangyang, to help him?" Yixing puts his hand back to hold his weight, it hits the hot side of the rice pot and he pulls it away quickly fearing a burn. 

Seulgi looks like she's holding in a laugh when she says, "We should. If we can get close enough to figure out what it is, we could draw up a seal and Yixing you could print it onto him or the empress, maybe that's what her sickness is."

"I want to help him," Chaeyoung says outright. "If we can, why not?"

"So you're not looking to marry into royalty?" He gets a leftover husk thrown at him for that. He settles down then, "Which one of us will be the one to go?"

"I will," Chaeyoung says immediately, "Seulgi's right, out of the three of us I can feel changes within the human spirit the best," she meets no objections, "you two can come as my maid and right hand-"

They should really get to putting away the left over husks. 

"-Yixing you could give me a seal that will make me even more sensitive to energies like that." Yixing can already see her mind whirring, seals and characters in both Hanja and Mandarin that may be useful. "All conscious, seeing... perception- I need a pen--"

"Simply the one for concious sensory is needed," Seulgi says, "we need to be as broad as we can we don't know what it is we could be dealing with."

"I need to give it time to heal, Yixing--"

"The body's concious perception," Yixing says, "should be enough to sharpen what she already has, the wisteria bloom will pin point it, she cannot be touched."

"...It's similar to what you have isn't it?" Chaeyoung says, "it's the sage and roots."

It's the sage and dried roots that cover Yixing's hip, follows the energy of his body down to his toes and up to his heart and head, cover his skin like lightning burning through the flesh of a tree trunk. He is safe from most dark energies as they cannot flow through him. 

"Yes, I could. But shouldn't we--"

"Yixing, it's a small one and it won't hurt me," Chaeyoung says, "not for a long time."

Yixing lets out a heavy exhale, the same fight Seulgi had, gone in moments. "Alright, draw it up for me and I'll do it."

"She can handle it Yixing," Yixing's barely noticed that Seulgi's already refilled the empty pot with the newly wrapped rice cakes, "come on, dinner is ready let's go inside. All three of us need some time to think through it." 

They settle on the next morning, Yixing's looking at the seal the three of then collaborated on last night. It's what Yixing had suggested, the "body's conscious perception" in thick strokes of Hanja, with a small wisteria branch along the bottom. All of it fitting within a neat rectangle that's meant to go along Chaeyoung's arm. 

Seulgi's helping him get out the ink while he sets up the bamboo, wraps strips of cloth around the barrel for the needle and his own grip. Chaeyoung's running an errand out in the village, surely picking up fresh jujube that she likes so much while she's there.

"Don't worry Yixing, it doesn't happen to everyone," Seulgi says, fingers pressed at the lid of the small box of ink in tiny bottles. 

"It happened to me." Yixing says quietly, "more seals can cause more energy blockages. She's gifted in what she has, she shouldn't have to lose it."

"And she won't Yixing ah, trust her. We've all got seals on us already, don't forget that." Seulgi says raising her hands into her hair and pulling the long silk length of it up and away from her neck, it swings side to side like a fan as she winds it up before securing it with a plain copper clip. 

From there now Yixing can see the seal on her nape, the same one he has, the same one Chaeyoung has on her wrist, the ones he put there. The characters for "the body's protection" there filling the spaces of a rounded triangle along the curve of her neck. 

"No matter what happens it's on us to protect her then." She says, eyes soft. 

"Of course," Yixing says, watching her trace the edge of a character with her thumb before dropping her hand to her side. "Abilities or not, we watch over each other." She murmurs. 

Yixing can only nod in agreement, he reaches a hand forward and squeezes hers. 

"After all, we're already watching you Mr. can't feel ill intent if it's in the same room as you," She says smiling. She turns her hand in his and squeezes back, intertwining their fingers. 

Chaeyoung arrives not long after, in one of her baskets is a small cloth bag of jujubes she plans to set out to dry along with rice grains and a day old loaf of bread. 

After placing it all in the pantry, she greets them both with a grin and takes the spot next to Yixing where Yixing's clients usually sit or lay depending on the space of skin being accessed.

In this case, Chaeyoung holds her arm at her side, open to Yixing as he secures the needle at the tip of the bamboo. Small as a pen, small enough to handle with control between his fingers, against his thumb. 

"Nothing will get blocked Yixing ge," She says to be cheeky, she pronounces brother badly because she knows it makes him smile and this is no exception. "We've been together a long time now, I trust you both with this more than anyone else."

She only winces a bit as Yixing starts to get into the rhythm of it, the steady puncture like a droplet from a leaking roof, sharp enough to make her tense if she focuses on it. 

The strokes come easy, each one imbued with the energy of all three of them, Seulgi into what makes up the character for "conscious," Yixing into that of the stroke that denotes "spirit" and Chaeyoung into the "body," together they form a seal that should allow her already keen senses of the human body to sharpen to a dangerous point. 

Yixing wipes at any dots of blood that rise to the surface with a clean cloth, Chaeyoung even nods off a few times as the rhythm lulls her.

It's done nearly an hour later, risen and red and slightly swollen on the skin, Yixing cleans it with water and soothing oil, before covering it with a damp cloth. He ties the sides down with strips of cloth, to protect it.

Chaeyoung looks at it beforehand with a wonder that evaporates the doubt Yixing had. Seulgi looks proud at the clarity of it, done with very minimal damage to skin outside of what was necessary. 

Together they agree to make their way to Hangyang towards the end of the month as the king is expecting noblewomen to make themselves and their interest known. They hope for less of an audience as the most eager will be there as soon as possible. 

Yixing holds the last letter he received from his father before his death for good luck while Seulgi and Chaeyoung get dressed. 

It's not a far fetched claim for the "sister" of a magistrate to be a viable marry to the king, even without strong political ties outside of a string of villages, it's worth a shot. Not that they plan on marrying him anyway. 

Seulgi pins Chaeyoung's hair with their nicest pins, smooth gold with opal insets, her short hair braided the best it can into small plaits that Seulgi pins back to form a ring that rests against her nape. 

Chaeyoung pats powder in layers to hide the seals on her arm, Seulgi does the same to her nape as a precaution, Chaeyoung would be even less viable if they saw markings on her skin. 

"Have you seen His Majesty's wife before?" Chaeyoung asks while she smooths down the crisp fabric of her chima, it's a glossy cheery yellow to Seulgi's gentle blue. 

Seulgi frowns, "No, I don't think anyone outside the palace really has. Everyone says she's just too sickly to go out in public without risk."

"What about you Yixing ge?" Chaeyoung says turning to him, he's put away his father's letter and now he's organizing his tools on the low table before he packs them away. "Have you seen her? Do we even know anything about her?"

Yixing tilts his head, "No, I haven't. The king is very secretive about the whereabouts of the empress. I've even heard she's not in the palace but a private location closer to the coast for her health. The most widely spread rumor was that she was the daughter of a dying family line, a previously powerful one and the king sought to reinstate the reach of her family. Whichever one that is, one up north I've heard."

"Like Yixing said," Seulgi's packing away some food into a satchel, some bread, some of the leftover wrapped rice cakes from two weeks ago, some week old fruit they haven't eaten yet. "She could be the one we're dealing with. We don't know yet and you or I won't know until we're close enough to feel it. We don't know sickness could be a cover." She's frowning.

"What about the king?" She looks down at her powdered fingers and blunt nails, "I don't think I've seen him either." she murmurs.

Seulgi pinches her cheek, "You won't be marrying him Chaeyoung, we're only there to deal with whatever this is."

Chaeyoung sighs, brushing Seulgi's hand away, she goes along with it easily, laughing all the while. "I know that, but like you said we don't know what we're dealing with what if we're way over our head?"

"That's what he's here for," Seulgi points to Yixing, "He's a demon's nightmare, he's so spiritually dense, he's unsuggestible."

Yixing's expression is deadpan, "I'm also the one that has to seal it if you haven't forgotten," he's smiling fondly now. 

"No worries little sister," Seulgi can't help herself, she pinches Chaeyoung's cheek again, the rise of it taut from laughing and grinning at Yixing's expense. 

Yixing feels a distinct sort of comfort that lies in the three of them being able to cover each other's weaknesses so easily, it's why they work so well, why Yixing considers them his only family. Only he has the steadiest hands of the three, and one missed line could mean the difference between protection and vulnerability, within each dot Yixing imbues his own spirituality and energy into it, a small piece of his own gurgling flow of energy and unto them they are given just a hint of his own protection, what keeps him safe. He wouldn't be half as effective if Seulgi or Chaeyoung weren't there to specifically tailor each seal to the client's needs. They draw up most of them and hand them to Yixing, they work in an easy tandem that gives Yixing relief and safety. 

Yixing is no swordsman, but his father was as the previous magistrate of the village across the rolling hills miles away from Hangyang, but his cover requires him to hold one, so he takes what was his father's from the shelf, and slides the sheath onto his belt. He'd only learned basic skills, before he found the spiritual to be more of his calling. Yixing locks up the gate to both entrances before they leave. 

They journey a few days on horseback. They stop for rest during the night, he awaits when they reach Hangyang and more secure housing is promised where he stays when he does business for the village. 

There are things in the forest, beings living among the tall elms and aging camphors, it's where Chaeyoung's senses begin to dull with the lack of humans and Seulgi's who's energy she gathers from the beasts in the hills, sharpens knife like. 

Being out only feels safe because her presence is a deterrent, she can feel the movements and the locations of every being in their direct vicinity, Yixing can't help but feel practically helpless as he feels little, he can feel the energies of the women he travels with, the only ones he pretty much can feel. He can feel when one or the other is restless, he sees the way they press their fingers against the seals on their skin as if in reassurance. 

Yixing rubs Seulgi's arms in comfort before they sleep while Chaeyoung brushes back Seulgi's hair with her fingers, she can hear all of them and it takes all of her attention each night, keeping her own influence in check, keeping them from suggestion. She shivers even when the night is late autumn heat, thick among the grasses and settling between the tree trunks. Yixing takes up watch halfway through the night so she can sleep, the two of then bordering Chaeyoung like parentheses. 

Yixing breathes in the now cooling air and feels anxiously numb, his only draw being his lack of awareness, his own blockage the barrier now for both the women beside him. 

Once morning comes, they stay on the path and do not wander from it, setting out as soon as possible with Hangyang finally within their sights. 

The village at the foot of the palace is awash in morning markets and frying food, people already full barrel into days that have started before the sun had risen. 

Yixing leads them back to the modest crop of hanok buildings where he usually takes up residence. He merely presents his own signed ledger for the village down the hill and a stock list of items he plans to bring next time for offering to His Majesty, to be allowed inside one. 

With a roof over their heads, they set to finally unloading their satchels from the horses, tied neatly outside, and Yixing says to get some sleep before they head to the palace sometime in the afternoon. 

Seulgi wastes no time in unfolding one of the folded futons found in the closet space, she's minimally rested from getting half the night but nodded off a few times the next morning while on her horse, Yixing had pulled her horse closer after that, the two of them trotting side by side, Seulgi's hand wrapped in the leather reins of the saddle so she wouldn't fall off should she nod off again. Which she did. 

Chaeyoung's helping her layer the sheets and pulling a rather thick silk comforter from the closet as well. 

When asked if she's going to sleep too, Chaeyoung merely shakes her head and says she wants to explore the marketplace with Yixing. 

With a nod and a suggestion to not wander too far, she still has to fix her hair to be presentable, Seulgi lies down and goes to sleep. 

"It's not that bad is it?" Chaeyoung says, smoothing down the flat of her hair with her fingers, "should I pull the clips and redo it?" She's asking once they've closed the door behind them and stepped back onto the dirt path of the residential area. 

"It looks fine," Yixing says frowning, "I guess. I don't really see anything wrong with it," he's saying. The dirt beneath his feet is soft and dry, well worn through with the large population, a population that becomes abundantly evident the closer they get to the main street and the paths of markets branching off it like roots in a system. 

Chaeyoung sighs, she slides her hand through his arm, hangs onto him once they enter the crowds and the bustle. 

Together they look around, at the decorative embroidered sheets one stall boasts to the dense loaves of steamed bread from another, they catch the scent of stewing beef before they're caught on an apothecary stall, which Yixing ends up buying some medicinal ginger root and cardamom pods that he wants to use later in either food or ritual, Chaeyoung sticks her tongue out at him for the cheesy joke. 

Yixing purchases some some rice grain and dried seasoned fish for them to eat when they get back, Chaeyoung wheedles him into buying a few eggs which they wrap gently in cloth and into their satchel to take back as a treat as they don't have eggs too often. 

"Seulgi deserves a good filling breakfast," she says. 

They wander the market for longer than they planned, Chaeyoung spies an ornate jeweled clip at one of the stalls, necklaces, silk bracelets and accessories line the surface of the booth and the wall behind the seller. Glints of bright opal and jade flash in the sun that steadily rises hot in the mid morning. 

"Do you think that would be fitting for me?" Chaeyoung points to one of the smaller clips, a set of three gold clips, each inset with an opaque rust colored jewel. 

"I think the one you're already wearing is enough," Yixing says lips pursed, he'd already bought eggs, he wasn't expecting to blow the budget this early. 

"Enough for His Majesty to notice?" She pouts, clearly happy to give him a bit more fight. 

"What His Majesty will notice is the seal on your wrist even if he can't see it," Yixing gives her a broad smile and she frowns. 

"I am worried Yixing," she says quietly, it could get lost in the steady level of marketplace chatter but Yixing hears her loud and clear, her hand tightens on his arm. 

"About what?" He simply says, merely to open the conversation. 

"About whatever it is that's in the palace. What if it does something while were there or it goes wrong somehow and we take the fall for it?" She's looking straight ahead but her grip is still tight, like the last thing she wants to do is let go of him. 

"We'll handle it together Chaeyoung," Yixing begins. "We won't know what it is until we know what it is," he says and Chaeyoung peers at him with the most deadpan look she can muster. Yixing shrugs, "You'll do amazing and after that, we'll get to figuring out what is needed together," Yixing raises his hand to cover hers, "You won't be working alone, it'll be like we always do."

That at last seems to comfort her, she untenses and falls more plaint next to Yixing, allowing him to take on a majority of her weight for a few steps before she straightens up but still does not let go of his arm. 

"Like we always do," she repeats more to herself than Yixing. She taps a rhythm with her fingers against Yixing's arm as they make their way back to their residential hanok ready to make some breakfast. Chaeyoung had heard Yixing's stomach growl while they were looking at the hand bound journals featuring spirituality and myth at one of the stalls. 

Seulgi is awake when they arrive, she's neatly folding away the last of her blankets back into the closet. She welcomes them both with a sleepy smile and she then pulls a brush from her satchel to begin taming the wild hairs at the crown of her head. 

There's a small coal stove and communal well in the back side of the small house that they use to make rice, they also poach the eggs in hot water once the rice has finished. 

All their stomachs are rumbling by the time breakfast is done and they eat it side by side on the small deck in front of the stove. The sun not quite at its peak yet. Seulgi doesn't hide the happiness on her face when she breaks the egg with her chopsticks and watches the yolk spread over the rice like a warm yellow blanket. Yixing gives her the remaining half of his own to clear his plate so he can start clean up. She gives him a questioning look but otherwise accepts it. 

Yixing washes their plates in a bucket of cold water with a cloth and sets them out to dry uptop the now empty bucket upturned on the wooden boards of the deck where the sun casts bright and hot. 

Seulgi's hair is no longer sleep messy but silky and unbraided as she helps Chaeyoung finish dressing in a different spring green hanbok, the chima glossy bright threads and the goreum a strip of pale pink. She rebraids her short hair, pulling each one methodically free and setting the clips aside beside Chaeyoung as she does so. She brushes any knots away with the brush and smooths it down with her fingers. 

Chaeyoung is repowdering her arm to cover the seals, Yixing did see some powdered residue on his sleeve while he'd been cleaning up. 

Her motions with the smaller more compact brush are practiced and easy, every shade of black disappearing as if it were never there. As if she never had any of her abilities to start with, as if buffing each extra sense away until she has only the starting five. 

Yixing and Seulgi end up in complimentary blue hanbok, they are her escorts after all. 

Seulgi's now braiding her own hair, turning each long strand together and apart until she has one long winding plait from the crown of her head looped neatly across one shoulder. Chaeyoung presses matching pins into the empty looking spaces, between the braids to keep them together. They're long and silver with a small three piece chain of baby blue stones that sway when she moves her head. 

Yixing brushes his own hair back with the flats of his palms, knotting it neatly at the crown of his head before wrapping it in a thick band of pale pink silk to keep it still. 

"...we'd heard from the marketplace, the king's been seeing women day in and day out, and none have reached his expectations. The villagers are starting to think the king's standards far exceed that of what is being offered." Yixing crosses his arms, "It's treasonous but they're taking it as an insult," his lips form a thin line. "There aren't many people that practice what we do anymore, mostly healers and spiritual psychics, but I have a feeling none of them are particularly interested in marrying His Majesty," He says frowning. 

He's sitting at the low table in the front room while Chaeyoung's nodding off a little at Yixing's side, her cheek pressed against his arm, Seulgi's gonna have to fix her powder again, but for now she let's her be. 

Seulgi's finishing up a small cup of tea before they go, she's tilting her head listening to Yixing's words like if she listens long enough his answer might change to something more hopeful. 

"Some would think it an honor to take care of His Majesty's empress," she says. "I wouldn't but someone else would revel in the opportunity."

Yixing holds in a laugh, "Not that I ever considered you one for the royal lifestyle, but you'd think His Majesty would have multitudes of people waiting to serve him."

"The announcement was obscure enough, perhaps too obscure, we only recognized it because we'd been pouring over those books for the last few months, we could've easily have not seen them and thus allowed our country to be run by a demon," Seulgi says, Yixing's expression tightens, "don't give me that, you know what we're getting into. Chaeyoung is our first priority," she says as easily as anything and she means it. Yixing finds himself nodding in agreement. 

"There really aren't many options," he says watching Seulgi shake her head. "We should get going soon."

...

Yixing's frankly blindsided by the crowd of women trailing from the gates, he keeps his head down and appears to hide behind Seulgi while directing his gaze into the forest and the surrounding village instead. 

"They're just women Yixing, how is it you can barely tap a woman on the shoulder but Chaeyoung can hold onto you whenever she pleases?" Seulgi sounds more amused than anything. Chaeyoung's grinning because she's always found it cute of a characteristic. 

"More men should be like him," she says smiling, "it's gentlemanly."

Seulgi looks satisfied she pats Yixing's shoulder, "It is quite endearing," she then pats his cheek, "that's our village magistrate."

Yixing can only turn redder and redder, he's not the tallest man but he stands a head taller than a majority of the women around him and thus sticks out more than he'd like. 

Seulgi pulls him forward with a hand around the layer of his hanbok whenever the line moves. The gate looms above them ever closer, nestled among the trees and sitting stocky in the middle of the widest part of the path. From the gate, the path to the palace is all cobbled stones and nestled flat walkways until they reach a much larger gate at the foot of the palace proper. It's large and deep red wood with an awning of golden drip tiles that shine brightly in the sun that has at long last reached its peak in the sky, already beginning its slow descent back to the horizon. 

Having never been inside the palace walls, they're gaping at the vivid green of the wooden structures and the deep brown hue of the surrounding decks that gives way to flashes of red and yellow, there are royal guards at every entrance and exit away from the main palace building. Yixing sees that curiously, the line circles the building, must they be going to a more private room, at the behest of the king surely?

Chaeyoung's wringing her hands and resisting the urge to wrap them into her chima lest she wrinkle it and be immediately turned away. 

Seulgi runs her hand across her back in a soothing manner, quietly, murmuring to her encouragement while Yixing looks around, they must already be feeling something because with his own stunted abilities, he can feel something bristling inside him. Chaeyoung isn't nervous, she can already feel something inside that room, something humanlike but not quite as human as it should be. Yixing shifts his step closer to her, the two of them blocking her on both sides, giving her a bid at a little more security. Yixing lifts a hand to take hers, it's clammy. He squeezes it once before letting go. Chaeyoung's back goes rigid the closer she gets to the door, the circle of the entrance wide and painted a decorative red. At the opening are a pair of royal guard and a pair of ladies in waiting, they're bowed respectfully hands folded beneath their green floral patterned jeogori, their deep red chimas hovering barely over the floor covering their feet.

The hall feels winding despite the hard angles and Yixing can feel something in Chaeyoung roiling with each step. They're almost too attuned in everything happening, too focused on what's on the other side of this wall to do anything else. Yixing murmurs a few words of comfort that he can manage. He's not quite sure she can hear him. She's starting to shiver a little, the way Seulgi does in the dark of the forest when all she can feel are the non human being stalking around among the trees. 

It feels like a hazy dream he can barely remember, he can't quite feel it, but he can feel the way Seulgi and Chaeyoung have gone almost trance like, Seulgi's eyes are darting down the hall and back behind them like she's getting more paranoid by the moment and there's a second before they reach the opening of the room and the royal guards that recieve them that feels like it's a death sentence. Yixing's knees buckle just breifly enough in instinct, that he feels like they should turn around and go home, but it's the small hand at his back that pushes him forward. It's Chaeyoung keeping him going into the room. He takes a deep breath and allows her to sweep him forward and past the threshold. 

The three of them bow deeply and as Yixing and Seulgi relegate themselves back near the door, only Chaeyoung can continue forward to the king. 

The king is sitting uptop a wide silken red cushion, his decorative hanbok of deep blue and gold stitching of the emblem cover most of his body and tumble over the cushion in a graceful heap. 

His face is round and almost boyish with wide eyes that feel set deep with exhaustion and the bright shine of the golden headpiece eclipsing the tired expression, casting it into a glamor that feels less than fitting but as if it couldn't be anything else. 

Chaeyoung bows deeply again and waits until he speaks. She does not look up. 

Yixing can barely catch onto what he is saying because he's so focused on the way Chaeyoung's energy appears to harden and slip side into the room like she's trying to steel herself and as a result Yixing feels like the room is in dunked into a thick fog, that the density of her energy will protect all three of them. 

Yixing watches the king's eyes settle on her and for a moment his expression, a minute portion of it, the bend of the brows and the small opening of his mouth look like the horror Yixing experienced before they entered the room. But to everyone else, it simply looked like acknowledgement. Like thoughtful acknowledgement. 

His words only come through in the next breath. 

"...My empress, she is too ill to experience the day to day rigor as the first wife. She also cannot provide me with an heir should I die prematurely. Would you fulfill this duty in her stead as the second wife?"

Chaeyoung bows her head further, "Yes, Your Majesty."

Yixing doesn't catch what's said because he feels Seulgi's hand wander onto his. 

"...The sister of a village magistrate?..."

"Yes, Your Majesty ..."

She's drawing characters with the flat of her finger against the back of his hand. 

"... and what can you offer me as my wife?..."

" ... the political influence over the villages my brother watches over Your Majesty. My loyalty. An heir Your Majesty..."

The king's own hands are moving, one is pulling a thread free of the cushion while the other mirrors it against the thick fabric of his own hanbok, unable to pull anything free and thus pulling at nothing. 

He sounds bored despite the fidgeting when he says that she is contention only for her willingness to serve him, for she cannot give him any political power and thus her odds are low. 

Chaeyoung can only bow in agreement of him, "Yes, Your Majesty. Thank you for your kind consideration."

Yixing can feel her energy beginning to sputter like a spark sprinkled with with water, flickering in and out dangerously. 

King. Demon. He is. 

Yixing feels suddenly sick to his stomach. If Seulgi's getting that much, what much Chaeyoung be feeling? Must she be feeling like her body is being turned inside out, her skin crawling in disgust and fear. Must she be feeling the human inside the king asking for mercy? Asking for freedom? Scratching from the inside with bloody hands for purchase? 

It's too much. 

"... I wish you and the empress good health Your Majesty..."

"...Your loyalty and bright spirit interest me," he says and Yixing feels his heart thud. 

"I'm honored Your Majesty," Chaeyoung says, still bent at the waist. 

"Until further notice, you will reside here in the palace until my decision is made."

Yixing's eye lids are fluttering with the revelation, he's watching Chaeyoung bow deeply once more sweat beading at her brow before she backs away never turning her back to him. 

"I am honored by your conviction Your Majesty," she says bowing lower once more. 

It's what's expected but also Yixing doesn't think she could turn her back on him even if she wanted to. 

The moment they exit the building, there's a wash of relief like the air is no longer thick, dragging them down like soaked through clothing. There's also a small group of royal guard whisking them away to surely Chaeyoung's new homestead in the meantime. 

Yixing and Seulgi are more or less intact as their senses were not acute enough, but Chaeyoung is now visibly shivering and Yixing wants to get them away from prying eyes as soon as possible. 

The quarter, Yixing's sure would normally be relegated to the king's consorts, is empty outside of the three of them, it's just as lavish as the rest of the palace, polished wooden halls and threaded tapestries across the walls, and blue ink clay teacup sets on the low tables uptop rich tightly threaded red rugs. 

They are told their belongings will be brought up from Hangyang within the the hour and they are to settle in in the meantime. And then they are alone. 

In the center of the hall is an enclosed well, a square of painstakingly landscaped grass and stone, with a small decorative pond in the middle and the pull of a well off to the side. 

She asks Yixing to get some water while she gets Chaeyoung comfortable.

Yixing takes his time at the small well to give them privacy, he places the bucket beneath the pump and watches the koi that swim among the brambles that dip beneath the surface from their position beside it as it fills. They dart back and forth, their bodies moving smoothly through the water, scales sun golden and red like the wood panels reflecting bright and crystalline across the surface. 

He feels the water slosh over his foot before he realizes how full it is. He lifts his hand off the pump after having been doing it mindlessly for the better half of two minutes. 

Somehow witnessing the king and what may live inside him does not give him any relief. 

Yixing pours more of the water until he's got a manageable amount left and less risk of spilling during transport before he's lifting it and making his way back onto the deck and inside. 

Chaeyoung's sitting at the low table in the room, her jeogori off and folded aside, in nothing but upper chest wraps, she's smiling and Yixing finally feels a little relief that she's okay. 

Seulgi's now in similar dress, her hair looks a little windswept from the previously tighter braids, she wets a washcloth into the bucket Yixing places beside her and wrings it out any excess water before she's motioning for Chaeyoung to bring her face forward with no room for argument. 

"Come here," she says, and she begins patting her face gently with it. Yixing takes a seat on Chaeyoung's other side and Seulgi looks at him. 

"She hasnt told me anything yet. We wanted to wait for you," she continues dabbing at her forehead, Chaeyoung's chin between her fingers. 

"Do you know what it was?" Yixing says looking to her. Chaeyoung's body stiffens just breifly, her hand digging into the fabric of her skirt this time, not caring if it wrinkles. She takes a deep breath and loosens her grip. 

"I felt," she thinks for a moment, "something hungry. The king isn't all himself, he's sharing his body with it." She says at last, expression furtive like she's still trying to work it out.

"Was it the king speaking to you or?"

"It was," she says, "it was him but the influence over him is very strong. It gave me... whenever he would mention the empress I would feel something in him shift," she's holding out her hands like she's trying to visualize it. "Like a different energy or something. It didn't feel good, every mention made my chest feel tighter and tighter and it got hard to breathe."

Seulgi looks concerned, dropping the towel in the bucket. "Yixing, do you think this is enough to formulate something?" She sighs, "There's too many, all demons are hungry for something we need to know what to really make it any effective."

"We'll have time to figure that out," Yixing says before she can start any line of regret. "We need to remember the king asked for help, he won't leave us in the dark unless he doesn't have a choice." he exhales sharply through his nose. 

"Yixing's right," Chaeyoung says, she's still taking deep breaths, measured and meditative in their rhythm, "he won't leave us in the dark if he can help it. When he mentioned my energy I knew then he could tell what I could feel. He could probably see it too. We came here to do something and we're gonna do it. Like we always do." Her breaths become suddenly much softer, her body more pliant and relaxed. 

It relaxes the two of them as well, Seulgi leans onto her elbow on the table and Yixing smiles ruefully. 

"What have we gotten ourselves into?" He scratches at his scalp with a finger. 

"I don't know, something we monumentally underestimated probably." Seulgi says, her cheek squished against her hand. 

Chaeyoung looks between them both, her fingers clutching her skirt again. 

They spend the time until dinner more or less resting. Chaeyoung lays her head in Seulgi's lap and falls asleep, they hadn't realized how much that one meeting took out of them and in so many ways. Seulgi runs her hands gently through her hair between reading one of the booklets she'd found on the shelf, it's a poetry book about temperance and modesty and Seulgi finds it more amusing than informative. 

Yixing's still seated across from them at the table, he nods off a few different times, between the lull of Chaeyoung's steady breaths and Seulgi feeding him lines about how the heron that flies on brittle wings cannot imagine the water below without fear of drowning. 

The sun disappearing behind the far off hills tinges the room a deeper cooler orange as it grows cooler. Yixing relays to them later after a messenger comes by that dinner will be served here, without the king in attendance and they actually breathe a little sigh of relief at the news, much too high strung to be prepared for an even longer endurance match. 

Seulgi and Chaeyoung still pull their jeogori back on before the food arrives, the messengers aren't privy to their moments of comfort. 

Yixing's never seen this much food in his life, it's less than the king's spread, that he's sure of, but it's more than he's ever had even as the son of a lord. 

Savory pancakes and pickled vegetables, steamed rice and steamed fish, seasoned crispy anchovy and sesame on seaweed, juicy cuts of beef and slow boiled broth, Yixing's stomach rumbles at the sight of it all. They bow in thanks at the guards that transported it, the ladies in wait who bring in fresh hot ginger root tea, and only begin to eat once they're alone again. Chaeyoung's happily picking at the savory cakes with her chopsticks, mind pleasantly off the thought of the beast dwelling within the king for once. Yixing finds himself continually picking at the braised beef until the plate is empty while Seulgi snatches a few pieces off his plate for herself. 

Despite all three of then having a similar sense of roiling and nausea in their bellies, they each eat a decent amount and save enough room for full cups of hot tea before the table is cleared by the ladies in wait who come back an hour later. 

They're told to expect no more disturbances for the rest of evening as the king is finishing up his look at his prospective brides. Yixing thought it had gone faster than he thought it would. 

Yixing once again excuses himself to the bathroom so the two of them can get ready for bed, he's about to leave to look for an empty room to sleep in when Seulgi pulls at his sleeve and asks that he stay there with them. 

Yixing stays with no push back. 

The next morning, they're asked to prepare for breakfast as the king will be in attendance. The ladies in wait ask for Chaeyoung and feeling her way through them all believes she is in well intentioned hands and thus promises them not to worry. 

Their belongings and horses had been brought last night before dinner and Yixing's kind of wishing he were back home where he knows where everything is and there isn't a risk of being labeled treasonous should he act out of turn at any point for any reason. 

Seulgi snorts, "Not quite cut out for this," she says. Brushing through her hair, she'd taken out the braid last night before sleeping. 

Yixing laughs, "None of us are. No perks either," he teases.

Seulgi looks at him, her eyes soft and amused, "And here I was thinking I'd never have to be back in anything like this." 

"We'll be back to our home soon."

"Hopefully sooner than later," Seulgi brushes through a particularly stubborn knot on the end of her hair. "This king better accept this patronage from us so we can go home," she's smiling. 

"You expect a royal breakfast every morning for the rest of your life I'm sure."

"It wouldn't hurt," she says finally putting the brush down and gathering her hair to one side, "One of the only things I've missed from before," she admits. "Chaeyoung's probably having the time of her life, she loves being taken care of like the princess she is," Seulgi's expression is fond and Yixing finds his mirroring hers. 

Naturally they are seated before the king arrives. The king eats breakfast on the deck overlooking the pond that curves around the entrance to his council hall. He says it gives him a physical balance between the political and the natural state of being is what Yixing's told. 

He allows Seulgi to sit first before he does at her left. Chaeyoung hasn't arrived yet either. A few of the king's advisory council appear to be in attendance, all in matching red with black bands of cloth beneath their golden headpieces. 

They take their seats on either end of the handful of low deep wood tables. There's already steaming kettles of hot water and tea in the center of each, a handful of matching cups as well. 

There's small talk as they wait, the other lords talking about foreign envoys and the impending harvest and other things Yixing isn't really catching onto. Seulgi sips at her tea, bitter but flavorful and stares up into the tree branches like she wishes she were there among the sand pipers instead. 

Yixing knocks gently against her arm with his own and gives him a withering look that's also comforting in it's own way and their silence feels lived in and gentle. 

Yixing hears the guards before he sees her. "Lady Son," they say bowing, Yixing looks around and the lords around the table have stood up and followed suit. Yixing immediately stands and does the same. Seulgi merely nods her head in acknowledgement. 

Chaeyoung hanbok is turquoise with a pale yellow chima, both embroidered with the stems and blooms of blossoms along the bottom and the sleeves. Her hair is braided back into a neat loop that's held together with smooth strips of silk. There's an embroidered piece, an open faced carnation pressed at the end of her hair part.

She's seated across from Seulgi which leads Yixing to believe across from him, the only empty seat left is where the king will be. None of them sit down and Chaeyoung gives Seulgi a pointed look that makes her stand as well, the king's arrival must be imminent. 

They stand quietly for a few moments before the king appears, the guards bow with venerable cry of, "Your Majesty." The rest of then do the same as they bow and the king makes his way to the cushion next to Chaeyoung. His robes are a vivid shade of blue with gold stitching, it covers his knees when he sits down, the rest of them now settling back onto their own cushions. 

All three of them had braced for the same impact of the hall earlier, but when it doesn't come they're caught off guard. Yixing unclenches his fists at his side, from his peripheral, Seulgi is doing the same, gently, innocuously and across from them, being as attuned to her as they are, they can tell Chaeyoung can still feel it, a paltry amount compared to yesterday, she actually lifts her head and gives them a little placating smile this time, no utter dread to be found or felt. Like itching at a scratch that keeps coming back.

"Please bring in the breakfast," he says once he's settled and sipping at his own tea. 

The breakfast comes in on decorative trays dotted with fresh flowers. It smells of steamed eggs and scallion and rice and thinly sliced fresh seasonal vegetables and fish. 

Only once the king takes his first bite do the rest of them begin. 

Yixing's body is rigid, sitting across from the king, there's an air of restriction that comes along with it, like he's being endlessly observed and one wrong move could culminate in his arrest. 

With the added stress removed Yixing finds himself really looking at the king for the first time. 

The boyish face is smooth and round, his dark hair is pinned back in a gold hair piece dotted with red jewels, tied neatly together with a glossy matching red strip of silk. 

Here as he brings a piece of fish to his mouth with his chopsticks, Yixing feels nothing but human from him, not that he can feel much, it's completely raw and clearly prepared with the utmost care in each thin slice. The flesh presses juicy between his lips as if just plucked from the sea itself. Yixing's tries not to fixate but the king only appears to eat the fish, leaving the rice and eggs untouched. 

"The villages over there," the king doesn't point with his hands as they're busy but instead with a vague gesture of his head in the general area outside the palace, "you're head magistrate?"

Yixing almost jolts in his seat, shaking his head of any whirring that might be going on. He hadn't expected to be addressed so quickly. He bows his head, "Yes, Your Majesty," Yixing lifts his head, "I watch over them all to the best of my ability. It's a pity to be away for so long but an honor to be here in your presence, escorting my ... sister as she is now in your care." Yixing says stiffly. 

The way the king's back straightens at the mention of Chaeyoung has Yixing's brows curving forward, the mention of her energy must not have been a fluke, he must know something. 

"Oh, no no no," The king says, eyes soft, "The first wife could really use a companion. It's the least I could do for her care."

"Of course," Yixing says, "I didn't mean to assume, my apologies--"

The king flaps his hand, "If you don't mind I'd like to have a chat with you after breakfast concerning those villages."

"Of course not, I'd be honored to discuss them with you Your Majesty," Yixing bows his head. 

The rest of breakfast passes with little incident, Chaeyoung states once more her hopes for the improved health of the empress. Yixing doesn't miss the way the king's eyes go a little wide, a little hopeful. Clearly Chaeyoung hasn't seen the empress yet or they would've known about it. 

The tables are cleared and Chaeyoung is swept away again by ladies in waiting, this time Seulgi is taken with her, Yixing regrets not having any time to confer with them because he's alone with the king, and the king is asking the other lords vacate as well for privacy. They naturally, immediately do as their told, bowing their way out the door and Yixing feels the stifling feeling rush back in the moment the doors are closed. 

The king sits on his cushion backed by the branches that reach the sky and the birds that trill like they're trying to keep Yixing aware of reality when the air around him is starting to feel a little swimmy. 

It shouldn't be happening. His energy flow has been virtually blocked for a long while now, he'd forgotten what it felt like it be as acute as Chaeyoung is. 

But this, the way the king shifts forward on his cushion, hands at his knees and suddenly the air feels sucked from the room, Yixing's suddenly boneless and struggling to focus. His skin is rising in goosebumps but he keeps still. 

"Your Majesty," Yixing says, "You said you had business with me?" He sucks in a deep breath to suppress his urge of suddenly upending his just eaten breakfast. 

"I wanted to know," the king murmurs, "I wanted to know if you could feel it." He says. "You're not as attuned as she is are you?"

Yixing shakes his head, acting like he doesn't know what they're talking about wouldn't get them anywhere. "No, Your Majesty."

"My name is Minseok," he says and suddenly there's a stabilizing effect across the deck, different from the loss of pressure but instead a steady one the feels almost harmless, it recedes to a dull ache at Yixing's temples, enough to push aside. "And I'm afraid you might be the only one that can really discuss with me at length without damage to your perception."

Yixing actually chuckles, "Because it's already gone. There's nothing more to damage," he watches Minseok's eyes go wide.

"I thought--"

"Most people do, they think I'm just not spiritually inclined, and I'm not. Not anymore. I traded perception for protection. I have all my knowledge and at this point now, that's all that matters to me. That I can protect what I care about."

"Not many go the way you do," Minseok says. "I won't hide. Your companions could feel it off me the moment they saw me. There's no doubt you already know." 

Yixing swallows, "That you're not completely human. Not inside anyway."

Minseok nods. "I'm deeply ashamed," he digs his fingers into his knees. "It's gotten worse lately." He's looking down at his lap, "I don't know what to do. My spiritual advisor says there isn't much I can do."

"And the empress? Does she have a similar ailment?" Yixing doesn't expect Minseok's shoulders to rise. 

"She ... suffers because of me," he says at last, once more hanging his head.

"Can we see her? We've got a--"

"No," Minseok says, jaw tensed. "No," he repeats softer, "not yet."

Yixing sits back on his haunches. "Your Majesty, we saw your call for help and we came for that and nothing more." He bows his head, "Our duty is to your palace," he says quietly. 

Minseok's mouth parts like he's about to say something but he thinks better of it and nods his head. "You may go. If I wish for your help I will make it known."

"Of course Your Majesty," Yixing says bowing before and after he stands, the door opening behind him before he even reaches it. Closing in front of him and then Minseok is completely alone. 

Yixing finds himself back at the consort quarters, neither Chaeyoung or Seulgi are there. Yixing can feel them still at the palace, their energies stable and easy flowing. He finds a brush and ink and parchment in one of the drawers. He sits at the low table and struggles to remember every feeling he was given, digs deep down into the block of his own energy for even a dredge of the remnants of what he could pick up on. 

He scribbles down the characters for 'loneliness' and 'hungry' again, the ones for 'duality' and 'merge.' Each one brings him closer to the seal he thinks could lock whatever it is away permanently. Yixing clutches his fist around the brush, it's not much use when he's numb to a majority of it. When all he can remember is the dull ache in his temples, the futile thud of a fist against brick when the system of vines that curl and wind behind it are what he needs to see. 

Yixing revisits the pond in the center of the building, the afternoon sun over him, casting gold against the pond's surface. Yixing digs his chin into his knees and murmurs his thought process between them. He counts the koi like they're different characters and that hopefully a combination of them will give him an answer. None come. So he just watches the ones the bob at the surface from between the roots and flick their tails at loose petals like they're bugs. He doesn't know how long he watches them for, one circles the outer ridge twice like it's looking for the break in stone that'll lead to the river. When it finds none it joins the others in the middle poking at the surface in a bid for a more fantastical escape. 

It's nearing nightfall when Yixing hears the doors to the consort hall shifting open and then closed. 

He hears Seulgi's voice calling for him, she must see his mess she left on the table because she goes, "Yixing, we're back-- did something happen? Where are you?"

Yixing takes a few deep breaths, hearing her and feeling both their energies filling him, replacing the frustration if only temporarily, with a sort of comfort he associates with their home back in the village. 

He hears Chaeyoung squeak behind him, having found him first. 

"Oh," Chaeyoung says, softer, "Yixing ge," which she only says when she can feel his unease. "Do you want to come inside?" She comes up beside him, the tips of her fingers fluttering against his shoulder. 

With another final exhale, Yixing nods and follows her by the hand up the deck and into the hall. 

"I waited hand and foot for this one," she says but there's no bite, "that's what I get for coming in as her lady," Seulgi's mouth is a straight, if not amused line. 

"A nice change to pace if you ask me," Chaeyoung says sticking her tongue out. Seulgi yawns as they sit down, her expression turns stony as Yixing settles there, he'd only smiled slightly at their antics but doesn't have the heart to laugh. 

Seulgi scoots forward to him, "Do you want to talk about what he said?" She looks to Chaeyoung for her opinion. 

"You don't have to yet ge, if you don't want ... we can wait." Chaeyoung says gripping his arm gently. 

"What's shaken me," Yixing says, "is my frustration with my own ineptitude. I can't feel things the way either of you do anymore. And he knew that. He wants help but he's clearly scared to, why else would he present himself to the only one of us that cannot pin point the demon inside him?"

"But you felt something Yixing, that's not nothing," Seulgi says, "we are the best of each other," she slides her hand into his, squeezes his palm. "Can you tell us what you felt? Whatever it is. We'll make use of it."

And so Yixing tells them, he tells them about the way Minseok sucked all the air from the room, the way Minseok knew his presence would be relegated to the dull ache in his temple. He says the empress apparently suffers because of him. The way Minseok's presence felt like desperation and desperate hunger. Everything at once in a confusing mix that Chaeyoung could've sifted through with the ease of a fire catching grass if she had been in his position. The kind of demon Seulgi could wrap her fingers around and metaphorically squeeze until it dissipated probably. But that was just wishful thinking.

"It felt like something that's lived within him for a long time. Too powerful for anyone to wring from him through ritual. Completely blocking his energy flow like myself seems to be the only option." Yixing scratches at his scalp. 

"We won't know that yet, we'll try ritual first and if that doesn't work then we'll finalize the seal, but we're still developing it. His Majesty waited this long, he can wait a little longer until we can figure it out." Seulgi says. "Does that sound like a good idea?"

"A logical one," Chaeyoung says, "You're capable Yixing." She searches his eyes. "We should go to Hangyang tonight, it's stuffy here and there's no use worrying about something that we're still trying to figure out. Yixing ge, you'll buy me that clip we saw last time won't you?" 

Yixing closes his eyes and takes three full breaths, each deep enough to provide the koi outside with a means to escape, with each one he's taking in their words and committing them to memory, taking what Minseok said and rationalizing each one just the same. He thinks they can feel more ease within him because they're smiling when he opens his eyes. 

They take the horses and slip out through one of the back gates, Yixing says he had business in Hangyang in relation to the concerns the king had for all intents and purposes brought up to him that morning. 

The village is still bustling late into the evening, people are beginning to set up carts to sell late night food. After tying up their horses, they wander the marketplace this time with Seulgi just like they did when they first arrived. 

Yixing can't help but be a little out of it even then. It's Seulgi that buys Chaeyoung the clip when they come back across the stall, she even pins it at the crest of her braid before they start walking again. 

The chatter is going in one ear and out the other. Yixing hears what seems to be travelers from China at one of the clothing stalls but he doesn't catch much, something about the quality, good or bad Yixing does not know, they're behind him now. It all begins to mush into one large brightly lit sea of people as torches and lanterns are lit one by one, dunking everything into a warm orange light. 

The scent of fermented chili paste and fried fish and tripe on skewers reaches his nose, makes his stomach rumble. He's not sure when it happened but he appears to have lost Chaeyoung and Seulgi. They'd been right beside him just a moment ago talking about visiting the apothecary for some calming herbs to make tea with, to not being there at all. 

So Yixing just drifts through the narrow and wider streets, all of them packed dirt, muddy puddles near the edges every so often, the tip of his boot sinking slightly when he's not paying complete attention. 

He's about to start heading back to the horses to wait for them there when he sees a figure wandering towards the edge of the crowd. Exactly where he's heading. 

It's a woman, her skirt is dark red and head covered in a accessory piece. He cannot see her face.

Yixing doesn't notice the ache at first, beginning to pulse at his temples, the same tightening in his chest rendering him unable to breathe properly. 

She disappears around a corner and Yixing follows, the closer he gets, the stronger the pulse seems to be, around crowded stalls where he loses sight of her, she blends into all the other tired cheery faces, the brush of her skirt sweeping behind a large hanging tapestry of a forest scene, embroidered talismans of good luck hanging from each branch bright red and flashing in the lantern light. 

Yixing doesn't know why he's doing what he's doing, the outskirts of Hangyang are hilly and dark the further from the market he strays, his heart is constricting in his chest like it could burst at any moment, a result of his already struggling breaths.

She appears to lead him in a loop, around the darkened houses and back around to the market. To one of the edges that sits strayed from the lantern light, her shadow dark and flickering in the moonlight, her shadow, that he sees first before her body. Her silhouette that stands darker than the night sky that could be her shadow itself. Her body resting amongst the dirt. 

Yixing's getting that hazy feeling again, but the empress is too ill to walk, is his singular thought as he comes closer, footsteps muffled by the dirt and grass beneath. 

His whole body visible now, Yixing scrambles forward on legs that might buckle beneath him. 

Someone pulls at his sleeve and he stumbles back. It's Seulgi, her eyes are deep and dark, the way she looks when they spend the night among the trees with beings that do not breathe. 

Yixing whips his head back to the woman. 

She's gone. 

Yixing feels nausea bubble up from his gut and he's unable to stop it this time, he immediately vomits into the nearest dry grass bush against the brick of the market wing enclosure.

Seulgi's eyes blink back to life, clear and brown and shining in the moonlight. She's rubbing his back.

"Are you okay? Chaeyoung's back at one of the food stalls-- Yixing, what was she? I got ... "

"The king," Yixing rasps. "The same feeling. But the empress ..."

"I don't know Yixing. I wouldn't have registered the way I did if that wasn't a complete demon Yixing. There was no human there. We need to see the empress. We need to confirm it."

"We should go," Yixing says, "I don't feel safe here," he stands, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

"The palace?" she asks, brushing back loose hair that had swept away from his knot. She searches his eyes. "Or the village,"

"The palace," he says, "Anywhere that-- whatever it is, isn't. Seulgi." He says, eyes wide. "I could feel it. Like I used to. Like the king's but stronger. The way I'm only attuned to you and Chaeyoung. It doesn't extend past that anymore. But this, that's something important Seulgi."

"We will," she puts her hand on his cheek. "Come here," when holds his head in her hands, "we'll get Chaeyoung and go, we'll figure this out. We'll find out why that's happening, we'll have Chaeyoung look over you," she says pulling him down to press a kiss to his forehead. 

She wraps her hand around his and leads him back into the market place where they find Chaeyoung in arguably the very center, she's sitting on a haybale next to cart that sells rice cakes in warm syrup, she's surrounded by the light of lanterns, her skirt looking more golden than the pale yellow it was this morning. 

Even she immediately notices how pale Yixing is. 

"We should go," Seulgi says. 

... 

The physical world is once again lost to her. She sees pools of blood and the powder her ladies pack on to cover the veins and the scratches. 

The hunger is already hurdling forth, forward from her mouth like bile, empty stomach, empty lungs, she cannot see until her stomach is full and the ground is soaked with what she cannot finish. 

No matter how much eats, why is she never completely satisfied? Why must she eat to maintain the only sanity she has left. Sanity that's already been torn to shreds like the skin beneath her nails. It's a lonely existence that lies hidden beneath the rays of the moon and between the trees where other creatures compete for her kill. Where she feels a jolt of panic because her death draws near, where death stands tall and empty as her stomach. 

Couldn't she sink her teeth into death itself? Would she feel the burn of the seal that penetrates his skin? Would she vomit the ink soaked flesh like bile? Chew death and spit him out as if he were remnants of stiff root, could she manage it? Would the burn feel as good as the hunger when it's finally, mercifully satiated?

The king would ask her not to. Would he stop her? She's beginning to see the king's heart as similar to death's, just as tempting, just as raw. 

When she eats, the blood enables her to see and yet she cannot see herself. The being that lies beneath the king's skin like a splinter that cannot be pulled. Like teeth embedded in the thick of a muscle, she cannot see the one things that interests her almost more than feeding. The body that enables her to survive, no matter how dire until she's bones and taut skin, and wasted meat for another being. 

She lives in fear for death looms in the depth of the pond, in depth of the ink that sits dark like the night sky, in the depth of death's eyes that look upon her in disgust. 

Her own only matching.

....

Minseok calls upon Yixing in the early morning about a week later. Yixing hesitates at the door. He's still shaken from the night at the market. Chaeyoung had felt through his energy flow that night to help what he had left to flow better, each portion of energy stuck in a part of his body, his head, his heart, his chest. stomach and legs seemingly stoppered like a cork in a bottle, the energy left to slosh around inside him from the restriction of space, his whole body an ever stiffening concoction of stagnating blood and energy. When Chaeyoung is done, she'd merely rearranged the configuration to something new but just as constricting to get used to with time. 

But now both Chaeyoung and Seulgi look upon him with worry in their eyes and a promise to keep an eye on his status for as long as he's not with them. 

And so Yixing goes. 

The king's private study area lies in his chambers, away from the council hall, behind a set of green pine slats that feature the same copper lion door accents above the handles. 

Tea has been provided and the moment Yixing steps foot into the room, the door is closed behind him and they're completely alone. 

Minseok motions for the cushion across from himself and Yixing stumbles forward, takes a seat on his knees and bows deeply to him. 

"Good morning Your Majesty," he says, not yet looking at him. 

"Yixing," Minseok murmurs, his voice is flickering in and out, barely there. "Yixing, look at me," he says and Yixing braces himself for the wave of nausea. 

But it does not come. 

Yixing lifts his head. Minseok looks more exhausted than he's ever seen him. If the Minseok up on that deck during breakfast was radiant, this Minseok was struggling to maintain a human form. Eyes sunken and dark, cheek bones stark against his skin. 

"Your Majesty--"

"I wish I could say it's not as bad as it looks." He smiles through cracked lips. "I'm afraid I cannot sleep. I've lost my appetite-- The public cannot see me this way. They already worry for the empress--"

"Your Majesty, I apologize for speaking across you, however, it is Her Majesty that I must ask you about." Yixing hopes the conviction is coming through, instead of the heat in his throat. 

Minseok stiffens, but this time does not stop him. "You may," he says, looking down at his hands that are resting against the flat of the table. 

"You said she is much too ill to travel? Much less visit Hangyang on her own two feet, too ill to walk-- Your Majesty, I felt something last week, I ..."

He watches Minseok's face slip into his hands, he heaves a deep exhale that rattles his smaller body. 

"There was a body found on the outskirts of Hangyang," Minseok says, "it looks like an animal attack. The man was no longer recognizable." 

"The empress--"

"I fear it was me," He laughs but it has no levity. So bitter it prickles Yixing's own taste buds. "I betrayed my own people, the thing in me, its feedings are no longer predictable-- it-- me-- I escaped last night I think, I'm not sure what I did but I awoke this morning my chambers covered in blood."

Yixing's frankly speechless. 

"The empress is me, Yixing, there is no trick to be played here. I have never married, I feared I would wake up to her body lifeless beside me," Minseok cannot look Yixing in the face."I want you to do whatever it takes, bring Chaeyoung ah, and have her look at me, please. I've lost what little control I've had since this all started."

"The demon, it hungers for--"

"The body Yixing," Minseok looks ashamed, "this is an old being. I was only a child when it claimed me for its own, already crown prince-- I fear it feeds on my own energy as well. My spiritual advisor cannot stop my energy, it's nearly impossible to."

"Your Majesty," Yixing holds out his hand, "Will you give me yours?" Minseok looks up at his outstretched hand with wide eyes, there's a flash of hope in them, the youngest he's looked since Yixing sat down. 

Minseok raises his hand, palm smaller than Yixing's previously noticed before. When he places it, he's barely brushed Yixing's palm when he pulls away as if burned. "Yixing--"

"There is a way Your Majesty," Yixing says bringing his hand back. "When I said I had traded perception for protection, I don't think you completely understood what I meant."

Minseok's brows raise, his expression expectant and perhaps a little hopeful.

Yixing pulls his own hand back, brings both to rest together, "The seals on my body, as you are now more aware of, and it's very possible your advisor does not know of this as there's very few of us left and very few of us practice the flow of energy as we are naturally inclined. That being said, when someone like us imbues ourselves with seals such as these, while essentially covering our skin in a shield, if you will, our energy is blocked in the process. It begins to lie stagnant instead of its natural movement."

Minseok's eyes are wide, "Surely those are the only risk--" 

"Your Majesty, despite this, it is best I am honest with you. Unless the seal is chosen specifically to combat the demon inside you, and even that's a risk, there are infinite combinations-- even then, it might not be enough--"

Minseok's hands form fists on the surface. "Oh," he says quietly. 

"The being inside you is old, as you've said," Yixing inhales sharp through his nose, "But I did not want to give you false hope as I would hate to do you a disservice Your Majesty."

Minseok bites his lip, "I guess not."

"But it wouldn't hurt to take the risk. The ones the three of us draw up have a habit of being for all intents and purposes, fitting to the task at hand. Your Majesty, it may not work wholly, but even then there is a chance that slowing the flow of your energy with it, will give you a better chance at resistance and resistance to the hunger." Yixing gives him a thoughtful look, one that makes Minseok's eyes go wide once more, in that expression Yixing could see the crown prince still unworn from the rigors of emperor-ship. 

Yixing tries not to notice the minute tremble in his lip. "Yixing, if it doesn't work, am I resigning myself to a life of even more suffering? Of a life where the being inside me controls me so wholly that I am no longer there? In retribution would I be running the risk of giving my body to h-- them?"

Yixing hangs his head, "There's a possibility--"

"Do not allow me to live should that happen Yixing--"

Yixing's body goes rigid, "Your Majesty--"

"It is my wish Yixing, risk or not, simply speaking now is a risk, they exist inside me at all times, dormant until they are not, and they become hungry. If I am consumed I am as good as dead anyway. You must promise it to me Yixing," Minseok's eyes are hard, but there's an arc of fear in the draw of his brows. 

"But Your M--"

"As your king, it is your duty to serve me. There are no arguments where I am concerned." Minseok says, hands still fists. "Consider your argument treason Yixing," Minseok's voice wobbles dangerously and Yixing lifts his head. 

Yixing swallows and bows. "I apologize for my insolence Your Majesty. Your wish will be carried out with the utmost care should it be needed."

Minseok's voice goes soft, "Thank you Yixing." He pauses. "I'm sorry. I don't think I completely understand the risk but I know that in my old age, if the being still exists inside me, I will be unable to keep it at bay. I will be unfit to run this country that has been given to me." He sighs, his breath low and ragged, "it would be best to... to... is it possible?" he says, voice suddenly small. 

Yixing nods, "I believe there is no true death for them, as the way they exist on their own, my companion knows how to choke them of energy but they do not die, it only drains them, deters them from coming close... Your Majesty, the seal is our best bet."

Minseok nods, "I suppose," he bows his head, lips trembling. When he rises his eyes are watery, the brown of them, dried autumn brush sunken beneath the surface of the koi pond. He chuckles and it breaks in the air. "I don't know if I'm relieved or terrified," he admits. 

Yixing searches those watery eyes like he'll find the right words to say if he stares long enough. 

"We will try to the utmost of our ability." He says, "I wish I could give you something more concrete," he says quieter, a little meek. "You deserve that much at least. It's unfortunate how much trial and error exists in a practice like this," Yixing's frankly at a loss for the right words, unable to find them in Minseok's face. That maybe they're there, hidden somewhere beneath the skin, nestled in the hair, lying hidden on his tongue. 

"You're giving me our best option, that's concrete enough," Minseok brings a hand up and swipes his finger at the corner of his eye to catch an unfallen tear. 

"I-- You're too gracious," Yixing bows again. 

"Yixing, can I trust you to be here come morning in four days time?" Minseok says suddenly. "I want-- I wish not to frighten you, but I want--"

"Of course," Yixing says, "I will be better prepared Your Majesty." He bows, "I understand."

Minseok's expression is open and utterly hopeful in a way that makes Yixing's chest tight. 

"Thank you."

... 

Yixing's never been secretive with either Seulgi or Chaeyoung, their addition to complete trust is what has kept them as close as they've been, as each other's family. But now, at the days loom closer, Yixing finds himself hesitating, unsure why. 

They can both feel his unease which makes it difficult to have any sort of conviction in the lack of information, and that coupled with Yixing being able to feel the way their stomachs tie in knots everytime he withholds it, he's crumbling the morning of. Chaeyoung's sleeping at his side on the futon in one of the rooms of the consort hall, one of her hands on his arm, as if even in sleep she were sifting through his flow of energy, feeling it swirl around, trapped in the space between his muscles and his skin. 

Seulgi is asleep on Chaeyoung's other side, facing the wall. 

Yixing closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. 

"Chaeyoung ah," he murmurs. "I was afraid to speak because this scares me." He says, watching for any movement, her eyes moving beneath shut lids. "I'm afraid that I will fail. Today I face the being, I think." Yixing tries to keep his breath steady, "in what capacity I'm not sure. But better me than either of you," he reaches his other hand forward to brush a bit of her hair from her forehead. 

The sun is gentle through the shades, Yixing can hear birds singing in the trees that arc over the building like a child leaning over, protecting a box of belongings. 

"That's what an older brother is meant to do right?" He continues quietly. "I took you in when you were only fourteen, I never had a sister but you're as good as." He smiles, she who made the grass grow and the trees bloom, she who taught him patience and reliance and comfort. "I'm meant to protect. God knows you protect me at every turn." He wishes he could see Seulgi too, he owes them everything. 

"I'll be back before you know it, don't be scared if I don't come back, if anything happens--"

"Nothing will happen," it's Seulgi's voice, she still hasn't completely turned, but she's lying on her back now. She's staring at the ceiling. "Like I said your so spiritually dense Yixing, whatever that being is, it doesn't know how to handle you." 

"That's the thing though. It does affect me. In a way only you two have before. Before I lost most of my perception. I'm scared it won't be enough this time. Best case scenario I get enough information to start developing the seal. Worst case--"

"We'll be here," it's Chaeyoung now, voice soft, "it's not out of obligation." she says, "it's out of love."

"We'll be close by if anything happens, just ask and we'll know." Seulgi says, just like how they know when he's upset or anxious or happy. They know it all and he can do the same, the only ones left who's energy he's attuned to. He feels blessed they were, at least, never taken from him. 

Yixing nods, his bottom lip trembling. "I won't be gone long."

Yixing finds himself at the door to the king's chambers perhaps earlier than he was expected. Two larger wide red doors with broad golden ring handles. Minseok's guards allow him inside where two ladies in wait bow low, and ask that he follow them. 

"His Majesty, has just completed a feeding," her voice is carefully neutral, Yixing feels something in his gut go tight and heavy. 

Yixing doesn't know what will come out of his mouth if he opens it so he clamps it shut. They round a corner where he's asked to sit on a round cushioned pouf in a small off to the side room, three ladies in wait stand at his side. 

Yixing doesn't quite feel anything through the door, just as large and decorative as the one outside, but he takes the lack of direction from the women and stays put. 

He sits there long enough to get restless, he can't focus on a wooden knot on the closest wall, of the speck of dirt on his boots, or even the gentle swirl soft energy of Chaeyoung and Seulgi three buildings away. Yixing's started to count the number of unlabeled opaque containers on the vanity when the door opens. 

It's one of Minseok's closest maids, she's bowing until the doors are shut. In her hands is a heap of what looks like stained clothing, Yixing feels sick to his stomach, like his instinct has kicked in and he knows what all that is but doesn't want to put a name to it. 

"Livestock did not sustain Her Majesty for long," she says, bowing her head, expression both stony and delicate. "In order to keep His Majesty content, certain arrangements had to be made." She says but does not elaborate. 

Yixing fiddles with his fingers before deftly putting them at his sides. "When should I?"

"His Majesty has asked for you after his meal," She says, "You may enter His Majesty's chambers." She then bows and makes way for him. 

Yixing doesn't know what to expect. He even shuts his eyes to prepare for the oncoming headache. He feels the door shut behind him and a wash of what feels like melancholy envelops him. It's nearly mid morning now, the room feels warmer than the hall outside. He takes a step forward and the wooden floor beneath him is still slightly damp with water, it smells of strong soap, he tries not to dig beneath the scent, it's thick and heady but he shakes it away before the nausea can properly kick in. 

There's a bed slightly elevated at the top of the room, a step up from where Yixing stands. The thin gossamer catches his eye, the way it seems to float even with the lack of a true breeze through the windows. They're parted, allowing Yixing to see the body lying beneath the sheets. 

He doesn't look like a king there, hair unpinned and seemingly ruffled in sleep. His body looks small beneath the covers. His breaths are coming soft and barely audible, his chest rising and falling and rising and falling. 

"Your Majesty," Yixing says, stopping at the end of the bed. 

It only takes a moment before Minseok stirs awake, eyes moving beneath fluttering lids. When he opens his eyes, they're glassy and opaque, unseeing. 

Yixing steps forward and Minseok inhales sharply. 

"I'm not ... completely myself yet," he sounds ashamed. "I cannot see, but I'm used to it by now." Minseok pats the empty space next to him. 

Yixing doesn't argue before he's padding his way to Minseok's left, he doesn't miss the way Minseok curls in on himself beneath the sheet, pulling his knees in and wrapping his arms around them, his chin resting between them. 

"I didn't-- I did-- I didn't want you to see. I'm so deeply ashamed that this is what it's come to," Minseok says staring ahead at a spot on the cover he can't see. "I could say they're prisoners, I could say they're villagers, it doesn't matter what I say they are, it doesn't change the only fact that matters." He pauses and breathes slowly through his mouth. "I'm scared this will go wrong, I'm--"

"I can feel the loneliness," Yixing says, Minseok's mouth closes and he buries his head further. "I don't know much about your family outside of your father, the king before you," Yixing says quietly.

Minseok shrugs, "Well you're correct. I've never told anyone the burden it's placed upon me, the hole it's burned through me. I think everyone can see it now." He says into the space between his knees. 

"I came here to understand the being within you, whose energy flows within you in hopes of being able to stop it." Yixing pauses, "I think you're full of so much pain, that you think you can't stop the way it's drawn to you."

Minseok makes a noise that sounds exhausted and low, he hunches up more if it were possible and Yixing feels like he's found the root of it. 

"Becuase I can't. I've been alone too long, there's barely any of me left," his voice breaks and the pieces seem to vaporize instantly into the gentle mid morning dim. 

"That's not true. I know you don't believe me right now, but please try to. You've got all the time in the world to try," Yixing says. He reaches forward and digs his fingers into the covers, Minseok turns his head in Yixing's direction, the tip of Yixing's finger mere inches from his sleeved arm. 

Minseok bites his lip, Yixing pulling his hand back as Minseok moves the covers back. He's wearing jeogori, silky and clean, the front open to reveal his bare skin, his heart beneath his ribcage.

Yixing feels the energy meet his skin like electric, it's sharp and stinging, but Yixing toughs it out, he's in honest wonder that he can feel it at all. It's still as if it were muffled, like it were coming from the next room over, but it's something. 

"Can you feel it?" Minseok says. 

Yixing nods, but remembering he can't see it he adds on, "Yes. But it's not--"

"Right after feeding is it at it's most dormant and volatile." He says. "It's-- she, is falling asleep."

"She?"

"The empress, this being inside me, manifests as a woman in my dreams. She cannot see while she hungers, and the moment she's full, her eyes go too," Minseok gestures to his own eyes. "She communicates with me while I'm asleep, she shows me violent things, scary things, things she wants to eat. Only recently did she show me another woman, one that she could not eat no matter how much she wanted." 

"Chaeyoung,"

Minseok nods, "The moment she stepped into the room, I felt her in me, scrambling as if she were trying to flee. I wanted to flee too. But I was desperate and she was weak. It was that first dream that pushed me to find her, to find Chaeyoung, seemingly the only person she was afraid of. In hopes I could get help before she overcame the fear and drove me to do much worse."

"She knew of its presence the moment she saw you too."

Minseok smiles, "I'm glad. I felt relief when I saw her."

"... Then must you ask for me then?" Yixing says slowly. "I can only do so much on my own. The two I came with are indispensable to this process."

Minseok's eyes widen, a curve of milky film glossy in the light of the room. 

"There was-- it doesn't matter, I think you could understand the way my energy works because of the way yours works."

Yixing blinks. "Will you allow me to?" 

He doesn't expect Minseok to already be raising a hand, he raises it slow, timid, like he's already bracing for the moment it touches Yixing. 

Minseok's pulls his hand back abortively before pressing his palm against Yixing's. 

For Yixing, the electricity sharpens to a point, spreads between their palms like a blossom opening to the sun. 

Yixing winces but it's manageable, he can finally feel the way Minseok's energy swirls beneath his skin. 

Minseok, on the other hand is gritting his teeth, he's beginning to flush from the neck to his chest, Yixing disconnects them immediately.

"What do you feel?"

"It feels like it's burning. Like I'm pressing my hand into burning coals, inside me, she's whining," Minseok's eyes widen in fear. "We can't, what if she wakes?"

"She won't," Yixing says and he doesn't know why he does, all he has backing him is fake vibrato.

Minseok's eyes drift to him, unseeing but seemingly intent on Yixing's face. His eyes dart down at his hand and Minseok finds himself moving it back, Yixing adjusts his own to meet Minseok half way. 

When they touch this time, Minseok's jaw tightens but he doesn't move it. Yixing feels a burst of heat against his palm and suddenly the pounding at his temple has begun, escalating rapidly from a dull ache to a thud that makes his head spin. Yet Yixing searches, he sifts through it the way Chaeyoung does, methodically and with curiosity. 

The being inside him lives within his very sinew, circled and curled around each blood vessel as if it were their own, Minseok's muscle their vehicles to movement. 

Yixing grips his hand tighter and Minseok makes a noise that's half pain and half surprise, the thud in his head is rising and rising and Yixing's focus sharper and sharper despite it beginning to feel like his head is being smashed against rocks. It's flowing through the entirety of Minseok's energy, from his head and his arm, and surely his stomach and his heart. Dwelling deeper than Yixing's ever felt anything. Hidden in the tiny crevices of doubt and burgeoning gape of loneliness and insufficiency--

Minseok pulls his hand away, chest heaving. He swallows thickly. 

"It's been with me since I was barely an adult," he admits, "I'm sure I was easy prey, I had nothing and no one," he says rubbing his hands gently together, kneading the reddened skin with his fingers. 

Yixing frowns, "It's ingrained in you." His lids are flickering, he squeezes them shut tight as the sharper aches subside. 

"Ingrained enough to render me hopeless?" Minseok asks. 

"No," Yixing shakes his head. "Your heart, if I could better understand the energy there--"

Minseok's pulling each arm free from the jeogori, he places it aside, actually folding it neatly from feel alone, his fingers running across the seams of the sleeves to align them. 

"How blocked must it be for you to be unable to reach it--"

Yixing chuckles ruefully, "I guess that's incompetence on my part," he says, "I haven't done this, learned a completely new energy in a many years, not to this extent. I can barely do it as it is." 

Yixing watches the curve of Minseok's back, it's instinctual when he curls closer into himself, once against bracing for Yixing's touch. 

Minseok inhales sharp when Yixing's palm makes contact with his chest. The ache in Yixing's head immediately doubles and he squeezes his eyes shut. Minseok's heart, Yixing's own chest tightens, is miraculously untouched. The energy flow inside him, moving around it like the tide splitting against a rocky outcrop. 

Yixing pulls away just as fast the moment Minseok doubles over gasping. 

"Your Majesty," Yixing's saying, he can barely hear himself in the rush of blood through his ears. "Tell me what's happening."

Minseok grits his teeth, his hand is clutching the patch of skin Yixing had just vacated. His whole chest is splotchy with red, the way Minseok's fingers are grasping and dancing along his skin, Yixing's sure he can feel something of a stingy itch beneath his skin that he cannot reach. 

"Yixing, you should go--" he murmurs, eyes falling shut.

"No, your heart--"

"Oh," Minseok's directs his head away from Yixing. 

"No, no no, Your Majesty, it's good news. If we can create the seal by the time your-- the empress begins to hunger-- but I'm afraid there's a risk of completely stopping your energy flow, just like mine--"

"If I don't feel anything I would consider it a blessing." Minseok breathes. Yixing's lips form a tight line. 

He bows his head, "I understand how that must feel to you."

"It would be a reprieve. I've spent most of my adult with it, every waking moment is spent in a hunger I cannot control," Minseok pauses, "and yet, I've been in this routine long enough I fear a retribution that's been ingrained in me."

Yixing would touch him to sooth him if he could, instead he settles with, "I see. I can seldom imagine what that must feel like."

"Nearly unbearable," Minseok says. 

"And what if I may ask, is what makes it bearable?"

"The thought of finding or having a family if I could." Minseok says spreading his palms over the covers, he presses it flat, the golden threaded lilies, the leaf accents. "It would make all of this tolerable, worth it." 

Minseok looks into the light of the window, where he can feel the weight of Yixing next to him.

"Last week," he says quietly, "I wasn't going to mention it, but I-- the empress showed me something and I fled the palace. I couldn't take it. I couldn't tell if it was real or not." Minseok's expression looks pinched. Minseok raises his hand again. Searching. Searching for Yixing, Yixing is scared to make skin contact with him, he doesn't want to cause him anymore pain, especially if the being inside him is stirring awake.

Minseok's eyes dart down to where Yixing's robe folds over his chest, his small palm making contact against the fabric. Seemingly satisfied, Minseok swallows. "I don't know why she shows me the people that could stop her. Is it a challenge? A boast? I have only one idea Yixing, I think she's showing me people that are important to me-- that could be. People that could fill the gap she inhabits and if I were weak enough I'd allow her to destroy them," his fingers dig into the fabric and Yixing moves closer to him, close enough to feel his puffs of breath in his cheek. 

"Yixing," Minseok says quietly, "I ultimately cannot make you do anything, king or not, it was foolish of me to force your hand. But I wish you could promise me that I'd make it out of this," his voice is low, like he's trying to hide it from himself. 

"You will," Yixing searches the cloudy film for the eyes beneath. His eyes falling shut. "You will," he repeats, Minseok tightens his grasp on the front of Yixing's robe. 

The slightest brush of their lips sends a jolt through both of them but Minseok holds on, teeth pulling Yixing's bottom lip to him and Yixing tastes the copper on his tongue. The ache at his temples is merely background noise when he has Minseok in front of him, shouldering half the pain. 

Minseok whines, like the same sides of a magnet, Yixing's whole instinctual body repelling him away. He pulls back, suddenly sheepish. 

"I didn't--"

"Minseok ah," Yixing feels out of place with his name in his mouth. But there's a tinge of something there Yixing wants again. 

His cheeks are lightly pink when he says, "I wanted-- I wanted to know what it felt like," Minseok completely lets go of Yixing, bringing his hands back to himself. 

Yixing wants to pull his hands back to him, wants to feel the heat of his skin, his lips once more. But the pain it causes is enough to deter him. He's sure Seulgi and Chaeyoung could feel the way his energy spikes with each press of skin. 

Yixing comes in close, close enough to press their lips back together if he wanted. "When the seal is completed, you can kiss me to your heart's content," Yixing smiles. He watches Minseok's mouth resist the urge to do the same, to feel safe. 

Yixing leaves soon after, telling Minseok to get some rest as opposed to continually irritating the situation which could result in some less than ideal circumstances. 

His gut feels a little floaty and not just from the nausea. When he slides the door open to the consort hall, two pairs of hands pull him in, both inspecting him for any injury.

"I'm fine," he says. Looking into their wide eyes, shining brown and clear in the early afternoon. 

"You look shaken," Seulgi says, "a little pale," she's smoothing down his hair with her fingers. 

"Are you sure?" Chaeyoung says leading him back to their room and the low table where she guides him to sit. 

Yixing nods, "It's an old being," he says, "where's the paper I think we could, with what I've learned, create the right seal."

Seulgi's expression goes from soft to almost stony.

"Tell us."

So Yixing does, as if a balance is once again restored, that any information he learns is also theirs. After all, they're better at Hanja than he's ever been, but the Chinese spirituality he's never let go of since coming to Korea as a child, serves him well in giving his own input in the characters they use. The hunger is arguably the biggest, it appears to be getting worse. Neither Seulgi or Chaeyoung bat an eye at the revelation but there is a slight stiffness in their movements for a few moments after they're told. 

Seulgi suggests, the characters for "moderation" and "restriction" but somehow they don't feel strong enough. Together they settle on "restraint" as Yixing says that block will work better with the flow of Minseok's energy. 

They spend nearly the rest of the afternoon working at and scrapping ideas. Yixing tells them of the lonely soul, how gaping the hole must be for the being to inhabit so wholly to control him for hours at a time. Yixing suggests his back as the location, he'd felt the congestion of it swirling around in his chest, perhaps sharpening a final bid for what's left human inside him. Should his heart be affected, Yixing doesn't think anything would work. He's sure Minseok doesn't need to be told that much. 

...

The next morning Minseok is found face down in the pond outside his chambers. The birds are trilling in the branches above him like a funeral's song. 

Yixing doesn't know if he'll ever forget the way the body seemed to drift at the surface, just like a lily pad, just as fragile, one big-- small bloom of blue like the rarest blossom hidden among the reeds and brambles dipping beneath the water's edge. 

He'd felt his very being seemingly vaporize into dust, leaving only an empty husk behind. No demon would be able to reach him for he couldn't reach himself in that moment. Royal guards pull the body, the soaked sleeves, their embroideries of gold looking like copper coins swimming at the bottom of a well, from the pond. Large orange scaled koi converge and nip at the surface expecting food like they usually do. Completely unaware of the body, for the body is but another bramble to swim beneath, a shade from the sun in the peak of day. 

One of the guards is shouting, but Yixing can barely register it, his knees are buckling. Seulgi's got her arms around his middle, holding him up, holding him. Chaeyoung's speaking but Yixing can't hear her either over the rush of blood in his ears and suddenly they come into full focus all at once, like a whiplash, a sharp whoosh of air dropping his soul back into his body like dead weight. 

"...Yixing ah, Yixing ge, he's breathing-- they're saying he's still breathing--" Chaeyoung's saying she's pulling so desperately at his sleeve but his legs won't move. When he doesn't go, can't go, Chaeyoung holds his face in her hands and says, "ge, you're in shock but you'll be okay. You can rest, as the king will." She murmurs and Yixing can only register her and Seulgi who's still wrapped around him. 

Yixing doesn't remember much of the next three days. The palace is on lockdown as they begin an investigation into the situation. No one comes in and no one can leave. Yixing doesn't think the public knows or will ever find out considering the king is still alive. All this will be in the grand scheme of things is a minor blip in Minseok's reign, an unfortunate accident that Minseok will gloss over, and be glossed over if not ever mentioned. There will be no reason to strike doubt into the country that their king cannot handle it. And for those reasons they will be left in the dark, mercifully, Yixing's not sure.

For some reason, Chaeyoung doesn't seem to be with them, Seulgi, however, makes sure he eats and bathes still. Each day goes in and out of focus until it's just a blur of memories, each one a grain of rice over steamed and over cooked until it's one pile of mush. 

Yixing wishes he could get the words out how grateful he is for her, for both of them, they hold his heart and his body together and he will carry theirs as long as he lives. 

He hears no one has been allowed meetings with the king save for his personal physicians and spiritual advisor so Yixing doesn't try. He feels like he failed, why would Minseok want to see him when clearly he did such a poor job at assuring him?

Chaeyoung has missed dinner again, she appears just after it, looking more and more tired each day since the incident. 

She squats to Yixing's level at the table and holds his face in her hands again, "Yixing ge, the king is healthy enough for visitors, he wants to see you." She says quietly. 

Later on Yixing will forget that Chaeyoung and Seulgi have been telling him that they've been doing spiritual sessions with Minseok in order to reroute his energy the best they can, to give the seal the best chance they can. It all went in one ear and out the other because he felt he was once again burdening them, here they are fixing his mistakes and Yixing wishes they'd been given a better brother. 

He doesn't even remember walking there. Like he's been forced back into reality, there he is sitting at Minseok's bedside. Minseok isn't speaking, his hands are bandaged and so is his neck. He's not looking at Yixing either, but when he looks, only to second think it and then look back away, his eyes are their usual clear dark brown this time. 

Just Minseok. 

They sit in a heavy silence for the better part of a few minutes, Minseok seemingly curling in on himself with the intent of disappearing. 

Yixing barely hears it when he says, "I thought I could stop it," his voice sounds like it's crawling up his throat, half of it still in his gut.

When Yixing doesn't immediately reply, he continues, "I had a dream last night. It was more real than any of the others. I was scared and panicked, I'd really thought I'd done it."

"What was it?" Yixing asks, he moves closer, still not touching. The last thing he'd want to do is make anything worse. "Only if you think it's necessary to tell me. But Minseok--"

"It was you." He says. "I--I'd--" he's feeling through the words like he can't get them out. "I thought I'd done something I couldn't take back, among so much already, but this-- it was more than I could take." 

Minseok turns his head and gives Yixing a doleful stare, searching his face as if assuring himself that the Yixing sitting in front of him is real. 

"I am really here," Yixing murmurs, "and I don't intend on leaving either. Not until I can assure you that you'll get out of this-- but Minseok, I want to apologize for not giving you the answers you wanted. I can't even begin to imagine what is happening inside you. How much conflict must be going on--"

"I don't know what I want anymore Yixing," Minseok says, "I'm losing more and more of myself every day and I fear by the time you enact this seal, that it'll be useless because there won't be anything worth saving afterwards."

"There will be," Yixing says immediately, he wants to hold Minseok's face in his hands, but he settles on spreading his palm on Minseok's covered shoulder. Minseok immediately brings his own palm to Yixing's chest. 

"How do you know though?" Minseok says earnestly, "this thing in me, if death cannot stop it what can?" He sounds sad, his eyes dropping to the bedspread. "I am merely its vessel, it wouldn't even let me die properly--"

"You are Minseok," Yixing says definitely, "you are worth saving because you are human. For once I'm glad that demon lives within you, for if it didn't--" Yixing cuts himself off with a sharp inhale through his mouth. "Listen," he starts to pull at the sash that holds the sides of his robe together, hastily enough Minseok withdraws his hand. Yixing cannot even be bothered to do it neatly, he hastily shoves the cloth away and aside until his bare chest and upper body are visible. 

"Here," he says, "because of this seal is why you cannot touch me without pain," Yixing shows him the portion of it that spans his side, the system of black ink roots that curl across his skin like veins. The seal of protection nearly at the peak of his hip. "If we can figure it out, and I think we have, you won't be able to feel it anymore, it will be locked away for good as long as that seal is on your body," Yixing says, "I want to try Minseok, please don't do that again. Stay first for yourself and second ... for me." Yixing finishes quietly. 

He watches Minseok lean closer, the way his fingers briefly flex before he raises them and then the moment before he presses his palm to the thick of the seal that feels like Yixing's heart is pounding in his throat and there's electricity beneath his skin, stinging and scratching. And then the moment their skin touches and Yixing feels his body working in instinct, this thought of pushback he's trying to keep tampered down. 

Minseok's gritting his teeth but he's not pulling away or crying out. Yixing breathes in through his nose and out through his mouth, anything to distract from the ache building in his temples, his energy flowing free as long as Minseok's hands are on him. 

Yixing nudges Minseok's cheek with his nose and allows their lips to slide together. Minseok's hand feels like a hot brand on his skin but numbness he's gotten used to for so long lingers still deep inside him. It gives him something to focus on while he keeps Minseok to him. 

When they part, they're completely breathless and Yixing finds his lips stinging, he's sure Minseok's probably feeling similar by the way he licks his lips, he doesn't expect Minseok to come in closer and lap at his lips too, it's both soothing and sharp heat at once. Endearing enough Yixing laughs a little. 

"Is this stupid?" Minseok says, smiling a little bit, "Am I hurting you?"

Yixing presses a kiss to his lips, closed mouth and quick. "Maybe the seal is faulty," he says playfully. He's not sure anything could keep him from Minseok anymore at this point. 

"That's not funny," Minseok kisses him back, his face goes a little softer, "I'm still scared Yixing."

Yixing gives him a comforting look, "That's okay. I'm scared too. But we'll figure it out."

"I want it to work. I really do. More than anything." Minseok doesn't say it but Yixing knows it might be his last bet. 

"I will do my best." Is all Yixing can say, empty assurances won't help what he's risking by trying it. "Let us figure it out first alright? No more rash decisions?" Yixing holds Minseok's shoulders in his hands. 

Minseok nods to him, "I didn't mean to hurt--"

"You don't have to apologize, you don't owe me anything, much less an apology. Minseok, from here on out we'll try what we can. Even if this first seal doesn't work, we'll try until it does work."

Minseok's chuckle is watery, "Okay," he rubs at his eye with the heel of his palm. "Okay."

... 

They settle on a date two weeks later, when Minseok is healthier and on a much more even keel. He's smiling again, and Yixing's happy he isn't doing as much pessimism as he's been prone to. 

Chaeyoung and Seulgi visit with Yixing a few times a week to help gently mold Minseok's spiritual self and his energy into one that's more perceiving and accepting of the seal. One that hopefully won't be rejected. 

Seulgi helps temper down the being inside Minseok in preparation, it drains her but she successfully manages to curb what would've been a feeding ordinarily. Minseok finds he feels like death the next day however, his eyes becoming unseeing longer than usual, it makes him panic that it may be permanent but Seulgi promises it'll clear up and he'll be unhurt. 

Minseok had no intention of marrying Chaeyoung, he'd just needed a cover to find her. In that process, she becomes more like a sister to him than anything else. Through their sessions, they've bonded incredibly quickly, Chaeyoung talks about helping him learn more about spirituality and in terms of himself and the changes he should expect once the seal is on him. 

The seal itself is larger than the one Yixing has on his side. It follows the curve of Minseok's back, a series of thin lines together forming a long rounded rectangle that house the series of characters within its bounds. 

Seulgi helps Yixing set out and organize the equipment like she usually does. They're in Minseok's chambers, the floor of his bed room, Chaeyoung's at the window sill, she's watching the potted lilies grow, watches them bloom broad and lavender near her hands.

She'd learned a lot from her sessions with Minseok, so much about the way demon energy intertwines with that of a human, the way Minseok can provide insight into the two sides the women that watch over him represent. Through Minseok, they're able to make new observations about the types of demons that like to inhabit people, things Yixing's only heard theories about through his own readings. 

It's early evening now when Minseok enters, he'd been busy the last two weeks assuring the country that he's not sickly or not sickly enough to forsake running this country. His results were varying but enough so he feels confident that if everything works out he'll be able to change those people's minds. 

Minseok wastes no time undressing himself from the waist up, Yixing busies himself with looking over the template they'd created and not on the sudden bare curve of Minseok's back and shoulders as the robe he's wearing crumples back behind him as he sheds it.

They'd laid down a thin mat across the floor for Minseok to lay down over when he's ready. Minseok sits cross legged at the center of it. It's soft and cool from the lack of body heat. 

Yixing looks up at him then. He smiles. "Are you ready?"

Minseok nods. 

Now on his stomach, Minseok allows Seulgi and Chaeyoung together to do one more session upon his body to prime him to better recieve the seal and further suppress the other non human energy within him. 

Minseok shuts his eyes as if in meditation while they murmur above him, Chaeyoung's fingers rest lightly across his shoulder blade and Seulgi's at his nape and together they're murmuring words Yixing cannot catch but knows by heart. 

Yixing thinks he can feel Minseok saying an usual goodbye to that part of himself. That he's not scared anymore. He feels the pride swell inside him, promises to himself that this will work even if he's here all night perfecting it.

Seulgi and Chaeyoung pull away minutes later, Minseok between them looking relaxed and pliant in a manner that makes Yixing pointedly look away. 

As they usually do, now it's Yixing's turn to do his part. With a promise of being close by should anything happen, they both leave the room to give him privacy and time to completely focus.

Minseok gives him a small smile there, chin resting on his hands. Yixing returns it as he scoots closer. 

In a comfortable silence more than anything else, Yixing wets a wash cloth and brushes it back and forth against the skin, cleaning the expanse of it. Minseok had taken one look at the finished seal a week ago and teared up enough Yixing's own eyes began to sting and he risked a bit of the pain if it meant he could kiss him quickly. 

Yixing pats the skin dry with another towel before bringing the ink and bamboo needle closer. 

"You're sure Minseok ah?" Yixing asks him softly. 

Minseok makes a noise of affirmation, "Yes, I don't think I'll ever be more prepared than this," he says a little rueful. 

At that point Yixing wastes no time in getting started after he prefaces Minseok to the idea of small pin pricks across his back. 

Yixing's fingers move back and forth, controlled and measured and he steadies out very quickly after not having done it for such a prolonged amount of time. He hasn't been home in over a month, Minseok had to send one of his lords to take over his duties in the mean time. But here, Yixing focuses solely on the skin in front of him and the pen in his hands. He watches with each prick of the needle as ink presses into the skin and blooms beneath it, as each dot is stained black. Yixing wipes away excess and he needs, the towel in his other hand picking up the surface ink that muddles the work space. 

He's completed the template of the border within half an hour, the lines equal and thin and even. They'd settled on the character for "restraint" as the main tenant followed by "moderation" and "protection" each of the three bearing the brunt of the weight of the being inside him. Yixing asks often if he feels anything because his own perception has gone curiously silent. Like it has been the last few years in terms of spiritually. 

Together the characters fill the rectangle in big blocks the strokes of each graceful and put together dot by dot. Each dot an inky star and the mass of the character forming the sky. Yixing stops a few times to stretch his wrist. He thinks the monotony and the rhythm has lulled Minseok into a light sleep. Yixing pulls away the towel beneath his hand and with a finger presses it against the bare skin. The seal isn't finished so Yixing expects the little ache at his temples, telling him to pull away. So he does. 

It's nearly nightfall once Yixing's finished the characters. They follow the curve of Minseok's back gracefully and sit uptop the skin with little irritation. 

Minseok's awake, Yixing watches his head tilt from side to side every now and again, the minute shift of his shoulders when he readjusts. 

Yixing begins to fill the borders with those of medicinal root and vines that pull the border and solidify it into a complete seal. With each press, Yixing imbues his own energy, more than he thought he could because there's a part or him that he knows would be crushed completely if this didn't work. 

By now the top of the tattoo, where Yixing had started is raised and red and a little sore, but the lines are delicate and placed with the utmost care and precision. The sun has now dipped below the horizon when Yixing seems it completed, he lights a lamp while he stretches his arms and hands once more before he cleans it one more time. 

Yixing had been surprised at the lack of blood, some of his clients tended to bleed profusely. But Minseok's skin appeared only raised and swollen, in the throes of recovery. He cleans it as completely as he can before patting it dry once more. 

It's then Yixing looks at the skin once more, curiously. 

"Minseok ah," Yixing says, chewing his lip. "What does it feel like?" He prays the question isn't ill placed but the answer is necessary. He's already bracing himself. 

"I feel," Minseok's voice breaks and Yixing immediately opens his eyes, he's burying his head in his arms. "I don't feel anything." He's sobbing, his back shaking. Yixing doesn't completely know which is which quite yet, he's moving up towards Minseok's head in the next moment. 

"What is it? You can't feel it? Minseok," Yixing doesn't realize what he's done until he feels the warm smooth skin of Minseok's shoulder. 

Just warm. Like a body should be. 

Yixing's eyes are starting to prickle. There's disbelief and a burst of relief fluttering through him. 

When Yixing looks up again, Minseok's looking at him, eyes red and watery. He moves slower than he'd like with the suddenly sore back but he's holding Yixing's face in his hands. Pressing their foreheads together and breathing each other in properly for the first time without the distraction of pain. 

"It worked," Yixing breathes. He's bringing his own hands to Minseok's sides, anything to feel skin. "And you're okay," he turns his head and kisses the palm of Minseok's small hand before nuzzling into it. 

"I am," his words are shaky, "I don't know what's happening, I don't-- I don't feel it, I don't feel her and she's always there, she's the only thing that's there when I have nothing. But I don't know where she is now--" Minseok searches Yixing's eyes. "You said I didn't owe you anything. But that's not your choice to make. I owe you my whole life Yixing. I owe Chaeyoung and Seulgi my whole life. Without any of you-- without you," he murmurs against Yixing's cheek, "I would still be here, but it wouldn't be me." 

Yixing's kissing him from temple to lips to throat, anything to feel as much of him as possible. Minseok's skin is soft and delicate beneath his lips, beneath his fingers. "Your life," Yixing punctuates with a press of lips, "is yours. My life, is yours," he says kissing him deeper this time.

"And mine is yours," Minseok says, his eyes still glazed, Yixing swipes at the corner of his eye, wiping away the tear that had yet to completely fall. 

"I'll take it," Yixing smiles, and then he's pulling Minseok into his lap and they can't stop. 

Yixing's sliding his arms around Minseok to press his fingers against his lower back, and Minseok's pulling the knot and the sash free to feel more skin. To feel his skin and not feel pain, the sting of it that he's used to. 

Minseok's sliding the robe off Yixing's shoulders in the next breath, his hands curious and exploring and hasty. He's pulling at Yixing's bottom lip with his teeth, playfully, hungrily, Yixing thinks peripherally how ironic that is considering. 

When Minseok slides his hand down the front of Yixing's pants, Yixing feels the muscles in his belly flutter to life, with his teeth he draws a whine from Yixing's throat. A curse even. 

Minseok strokes him eagerly, with no consideration for plans of any kind. Like he's starved of contact and from Yixing he's compensating for all the lost time. 

Yixing's completely stiff in Minseok's palm when he slides his hands down the back of Minseok's pants, squeezes the curve of his ass, and Minseok's gasping into his mouth. 

Minseok is saying his name, humming it, breathing it, burying himself into the concept of Yixing if he tried hard enough. He pulls away to shove his pants down, not even bothering to fold them like he usually does before he's back in Yixing's lap, completely bare and holding his face close because Yixing's kisses finally feel like they belong to him and him only.

His cock is delicate like the rest of him, pink like his lips, dripping clear like Yixing's tongue pulling away from his mouth. Yixing slides his fingers along the shaft, presses his thumb up against the spread of the crown and Minseok's mouth falls open, slack and his eyes slip shut. His hands moving to curl around Yixing's shoulders instead, to press them back together until what Yixing breathes is what Minseok gives him and Minseok's skin is Yixing's beneath his hands. 

The moment Yixing take them both into his palm, there's a burst of something behind his eyes, as if through trial by fire Minseok's status is now his to feel. And to feel his own pleasure two fold has a groan bubbling low from the depths of his throat. 

Minseok's murmuring how much he wants Yixing, how much he craves Yixing in a tone that borders a desperation that Yixing feels rattling in his gut, traveling the length of his cock like a live wire until he's holding Minseok up around the hips so he can slide his fingers back between his cheeks. 

Minseok's pulling at his lips again with his teeth, completely enraptured in him and the way Yixing seems to feel his pleasure like it's his own. 

The floor of Minseok's chambers is cold and wooden, dark and crisp, a contrast to Minseok's skin that seems to almost glow in the setting sun, in the dim of nightfall. Yixing's using one of the oils from his kit to soak his fingers and press into Minseok. Minseok's toes curl and he leaks a thick pearl of precome between their bellies. 

And when Yixing's cock slides inside and Minseok's struggling to relax because he's so high strung and in need of everything that is Yixing, Yixing kisses the rattling breaths from him, pulls them from his chest and out of his mouth until Minseok is nestled so completely in his lap, Yixing feels he knows the feeling of complete and utter satisfaction. Minseok connects their lips and breathes his name, that in this moment they are the same body, the same breath and the same pleasure. 

Minseok comes toes curling, riding his breath are the heavy sweets, feverish endearments and Yixing's name like it's the only thing he's committed to memory in his life.

Yixing kisses the exhaustion from his eyes, runs his fingers through the gentle sweat that covers his body, his eyes shut tight, his gut finally pulling taut and climbing, climbing, climbing until he humms a release that resonates into Minseok's throat so wholly, it could be Minseok's. 

Minseok rests their foreheads together briefly before pressing a kiss there and finally chuckling out a relief that consumes him, a love that consumes him. 

Yixing repeats them slowly, happily.

... 

What the palace does choose to inform the public of is the death of the empress. Seemingly passed away the week before they announced it. It's surreal for Minseok to see the sea of offerings placed before the gate that leads to the palace. He's unable to imagine what the rest of the country and the villages within must look like. He finds the offerings to be bittersweet, of course his people don't know any better, he doesn't blame them.

He hasn't felt the being in him for over a month now and he's still not used to it. Not used to having his thoughts only to himself. Not used to the gaping hole in him being filled little by little but it somehow still not feeling like enough. It's almost like he's mourning a part of himself. How apt. The sudden emptiness makes him feel like a tiny stone rolling around an even bigger tumbler. Rattling and jumping and scraping with no place to settle, no place to fit the way a pebble sits nestled in the riverbed. It's like an endless free fall. 

There's a constant ringing in his ears, where he imagines her being, where she used to be. He feels foolish for even thinking it, but there's a part of himself that yearns for that space to be filled. It's not missing. He doesn't miss her. He just misses the feeling of being whole, even if that space was filled with craggy rocks and broken glass. He wishes it would remedy itself immediately. He'd thought Yixing could fill it with his hands, stop the bleeding. But there's just so much of him that has already bled out. 

His country sees him even less now. He withdraws like a puppet crumpling without the tension no longer holding him up. He wasn't the only one that believed that he would blossom now that he's no longer hindered. Minseok finds himself spending more time with Chaeyoung and Seulgi now that Yixing takes regular trips back down to his own village to settle business. When Yixing's not there, Minseok occupies his time learning more about the energy within the body and how it effects the human condition. He watches Chaeyoung run rampant in his personal gardens, the way the vines and the carnations seem to just bloom when she's close to them. 

He's smiles from his shaded spot at the low table with hot tea that smells of ginger root. Seulgi sits across from him and they talk about how Chaeyoung's growth has become more than any of them thought it could. The way she's adopted a lot of Seulgi's penchants for being attuned to the pure demons that walk among the trees. That she's able to deter them now on her own too. Seulgi laughs a little ruefully as she still hasn't gotten the hang of the growing an ear of corn for god's sake. She neglects to mention that she's been more recently particularly adept at growing plants that turn out to be quite poisonous. 

Otherwise at the end of the day, Minseok feels the bed dip behind him and then Yixing's solid weight wrapping around him and nestling against his nape. 

"How have you been doing?" Yixing murmurs, "..sorry I was gone so long--it really takes a village--" he laughs. 

Minseok nestles back against him, "It's still ... not great." he admits, voice soft. 

Yixing holds him just slightly tighter, Minseok's body small in his arms. 

"I'm sorry," he says, "it's a long process isn't it?" he smiles against Minseok's skin, "But I know you can do it. I'll help the best I can." 

Minseok would melt into Yixing's body if he could. That Yixing's dense body could carry his weight. That his own now dense body is not yet strong enough to. 

"I-- thank you Yixing." Minseok says in the dark. "I'm so thankful for you." he hopes in those words Yixing can hear the everything he wants to convey, even the things he's not yet ready to say.

Yixing nuzzles against him, breathes against his warm skin, his nose brushing Minseok's hair at his nape. 

"I'd give you everything if I could."

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my suho who got me through this one as well. It was a hard one and at the end of the day, I'm satisfied with it. I'm love u~


End file.
